


Stitches

by SpookshowBabyx



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-22
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2018-03-25 07:13:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 29
Words: 48,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3801469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpookshowBabyx/pseuds/SpookshowBabyx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>House comes to Cameron's aid when she gets into trouble with a patient in the ER and brings to question once again whether she wouldn't be happier working for him again, especially when a case begins to interfere with their lives outside of the hospital. Beginning to fear that he's pulled his ex employee in too deep, he wonders if it's too little too late.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I've had a few people ask why I haven't done a longer House fic like I do with my Once ones, so this is the beginning of my attempt at a longer, more involved piece. I didn't think I would ever want to write a post season 3 story as I'm much more in favor of the original team, but for some reason it just seemed to work out better, so I guess this is also a little bit of an experiment. This won't follow the show's storyline particularly, and works off the premise that Chase and Cameron went separate ways a little after the 'it's Tuesday, I like you' conversations and are now just friends. Enjoy, and please please please comment! :)

House grumbles as he limps after the Dean of Medicine; sure that she stalks the halls at an increased pace simply to irk him. He decides not to let a little touch of what he presumes to be premenstrual irritability deter him and proceeds to bark after her loudly, arguing his case to the dark waves that grace the back of her head. When he reaches the point at which he suggests a really rather controversial use of the hospital's most advanced MRI machine, he finally gets her undivided attention and she whirls round to face him, brow creased and notepad of blue scrawl flapping in her hand.

"House, I'm not even going to _bother_ answering that last question! If you want to do the rest of the tests, fine, get consent- _legal_ consent- and ask one of your team to help you, but quit pestering _me_ , I have far too much that needs doing without having to _babysit_ you-"

As if on cue she is interrupted by a commotion down the hall. The already hectic scurrying of patients in various states of health- and the doctors watching wearily over them- reaches a new crescendo, and as the doors to the ER swing open, an accompaniment of crashing and wailing comes into play. Frowning with an exhausted sigh, Cuddy hurries over to inspect the cause of all the commotion, House following along for the simple reason that it will allow him another five minutes away from his current patient who seems hellbent on converting him to the Church of Jehovah.

By the time they reach the large fire-doors leading to the ER, the hoarse yelling has been replaced by a choked growl as a man in his late thirties lies sprawled on the floor beneath a gray clad security officer. His rage-reddened face is spattered with a spray of scarlet and his eyes speak of a state long past simple inebriation. A panic-stricken nurse huddles in the corner- her face paper white- beside a small blonde who mutters to her reassuringly.

Recognising his ex-employee, House makes his way over, his brow furrowing as his eyes fall to the quick blooming rose at the young doctor's hip. He is halfway across the room when the distraught nurse clues in on her colleague's injury also and begins hollering for help as green eyes regard her in confusion.

"We need some help over here, we need-"

"-Stop that, go get your hand seen to, your finger's bleeding... Cameron..."

She glances up at him warily and he feels the familiar twinge of that old unwanted- but not wholly unpleasant- emotion as her eyes light up upon realizing who comes towards her. He moves to stand between the young nurse- now cradling her hand with shaking fingers- and the blonde, and rests his hand at her waist gently, the action causing her to jump and let out a small gasp.

Regarding House curiously, it isn't until Cameron follows the direction of his ice-blue stare that she notices the blood soaking the side of her scrubs. Eyes widening, she simply mutters

"Oh."

The graying doctor returns his attention to glittering green with a frown, the blonde's lack of reaction to her injury a little disconcerting.

"You can't feel that?"

"No, I can now, I just... It just happened so quickly and I..."

At first he thinks she's simply trailing off- her tone almost mistakable for disinterest- but he recognizes the glassy cast to her gaze easily and tightens his grip at her waist, pulling at her gently so that she leans into him as a precaution.

"Hey now, come on, no fainting at the work place, Doctor, look alive please."

She offers him a small grin, her pallor an alarming contrast to her expression, and he looks up to find Cuddy watching him with a worried frown as she nods at something the security guard says. Tilting his head pointedly over to one of the small examination rooms to the left, the Dean nods and calls over

"Page Taub or Hadley, tell them to do the tests requested for your patient."

He nods, ushering Cameron over towards the door, taking in the way the young doctor leans on him heavily with each alternate step with mild concern. Cuddy turns back to the security officer, trying to get a handle on the turn of events, while several nurses already hurry about to collect strewn bedpans and implements. She knows full well that any one of the ER nurses could be trusted to see to the blonde- and she imagines Cameron is aware of this also- but she knows too that it has to be House. She sighs and gives a small shake of her head, forbidding herself to even _attempt_ to strive to understand the peculiar relationship that exists between her friend and his ex-employee.

* * *

"Lie down."

House's voice is stern as he offloads the blonde so that she perches on the paper-covered bed, but his expression is pensive rather than hard.

"I'm sure it's just a nick, you know how scalpels can-"

"-Get naked and let's see before we jump to any conclusions, Dr Cameron."

She rolls her eyes- her face a little too pale to pull the gesture off as well as she'd like- but she lies back gingerly, her mind still racing with the events leading up to her current predicament and thus allowing her to escape some of the awkwardness inevitable between them.

Despite his sarcastic request, it is House who plucks the soft pink material of her scrubs up, his eyes steely as he fixates on damning scarlet staining the white cotton of her top. Shucking the ruined fabric out of the way gently, his attention is focused completely on the crimson slash to alabaster flesh, although he will later tell Wilson his interest had been primarily in the green flash of lace peeking out above the hem of her scrubs.

Pulling over a stool and perching on it casually, he leans his cane against the hard leather of the bed and reaches for a pair of gloves and a packet of antiseptic wipes. He doesn't bother telling her it will sting- she knows- but he does offer her a warning glance before pressing stark white to bloodied flesh, his eyes flashing at the choked hiss she lets out through clenched teeth.

"So, what happened?"

"I don't even know, really... He was brought in to us about an hour ago with a head injury. As you probably saw, he wasn't exactly in the most coherent state, so it was the usual, you know, big talk, crass words, mild insults, and the promise of a good, uh, seeing to-"

"-A good seeing to?"

House raises an eyebrow and the blonde blushes.

" _Don't_ make me spell it out for you, House. Anyway, none of this is anything new, I mean, it gets to about ten o' clock and most of the drop-offs we get are the same-"

"-And you claim you don't miss working for me..."

"I _don't_ miss you."

"Not what I said..."

"Yeah... Well... If you recall, while working for _you_ I was still almost strangled, not to mention I was pulled through a pane of glass and-"

"-Ah but that was entirely _your_ fault! I recall your little stunt, Dr Cameron, just as I recall the reason Shamu found himself pulling the young princess through a sheet of glass had an awful lot to do with the fact she'd deemed it a brilliant idea to _drug_ him."

"You get my point."

"Okay, so, crazypants in there was busy sweet-talking you into a quickie in the janitor's closet, then what?"

"I don't know... Nancy got upset and told him to stop it-"

"-Nancy's Miss I'm-a-nurse-but-I-can't-stand-the-sight-of-blood?"

"She's a good nurse, she's probably just not used to some guy jumping up and trying to wrestle her onto a bed..."

"...Whereas _you-_ "

"-Whereas I worked for _you_ for three years; nothing will surprise me... I'd been trying to get some pieces of broken glass out of a wound above his eyebrow and I'd pulled over the trolley... I kept telling him to pipe down and he was just being an asshole, laughing because he kept goosing me-"

The blonde rolls her eyes and House smirks as he imagines she's inwardly muttering 'men...'

"-So I put the scalpel down because he was moving so much, and... I don't know... I turned around and then he was up, and he grabbed Nancy and I just tried to pull him off... He must've grabbed the scalpel I guess, it was just all really quick... I pulled him off her but we both ended up on the floor. I saw that there was blood and I felt something sharp in my side but then everyone was yelling and Nancy was screaming and then Dick pulled him off me and... Never a dull moment here, I guess."

House nods, taking in everything the blonde says but never averting his attention from the cut at her side. The incision is deep- deeper than she realises he imagines, although he supposes it would be just like Cameron to brush off her own pain despite being so adept at sympathising with another's- and he applies a small amount of pressure to the laceration; ugly and dark now that he has cleaned up the surrounding flesh.

"Well I don't think he's nicked anything vital to your survival, but stay put while I thread up a needle."

"It's cool, I'll just patch it up, you should be getting back to-"

"-If you so much as _think_ about sitting up I will push you right back down again, Dr Cameron...Don't make me force you into bed..."

"House, it's fine-"

"-You see, _this_ is why I don't like training doctors, they complete their fellowship and they think they know better than everyone else-"

"-I never said-"

"-Just trust me, Cameron."

"...I do."

Nodding, House reaches for a syringe and proceeds to prepare a local anaesthetic, but the young doctor shakes her head, looking up at him from the table, her long hair fanning out beneath her.

"Don't use that; I'm still on the clock for the next three hours and I can't work if I can't-"

She yelps as House raises an eyebrow and proceeds to hone in on taut flesh despite her request not to, and sighs as the graying doctor depresses the plunger.

"-walk..."

"Oh well. "

"House..."

Shrugging, he gives her a wry smile as he removes a suture needle from its plastic packaging, crystal blue regarding irritable green intensely. He gives the broken flesh just above her skinny hipbone one final swipe with the antiseptic before leaning over her and going to work.

She is surprised at how long he takes to complete his task; years of standing by and watching him perform the same duty providing her with the knowledge that he is more than capable of getting the job done in half the time he currently takes. Lifting her head in an attempt to peer down at the area of concern, she grumbles as he immediately tells her to lie still without so much as glancing up at her.

"Patience... Just enjoy the fact that I'm working so close to the area that makes you scream-"

"- I do not-"

"-Moan then, I wouldn't know, we never got that far."

"Oh, shut up."

House grins, the young immunologist's grumbling pleasantly familiar, and the pull to her mouth as he slips the needle in and out of pale flesh not quite so painful to watch out of the corner of his eye as she engages in their old back and forth. He snips the surgical thread deftly once sure he's finished and rolls his eyes as Cameron mutters 'finally'.

She sits up to inspect the damage and raises an eyebrow in surprise but remains silent. They both know that she's pondering the time he has taken to finish his task and that the reason behind it is the meticulous care taken with each suture; his stitching complex but greatly reducing the amount of potential scarring.

"...Thank you"

"Don't mention it."

Cameron smiles at him and House offers her a gruff grunt.

"Did you drive?"

"Huh?"

"To work- sit down, I'm not helping you back up if you fall over- did you drive?"

"Yeah."

"Don't think it's the best plan to have you drive back... I'll take you home once I'm off the clock. You'll just have to leave your car here-"

"-You don't have to-"

"-I know that, and don't be getting any _ideas_ either, doctor, I just don't want to be on the road at the same time as a girl with no feeling in one leg."

"Well... Thanks... Do you think you could grab me my file of paperwork if I'm going to be stuck here a while? I'll just get some of that done-"

"-Absolutely not. You have a chance to relax, I would consider myself a terrible role model should you be unable to take it!"

Reaching into his back pocket, he pulls out his Gameboy and thrusts it onto her lap.

"You beat my best score and I'll buy you dinner."


	2. Chapter 2

By the time House finishes up his shift- knocking off the last twenty minutes for what he argues to be good behavior- his current patient is ready to be dispatched and his team has already packed up an left. Making his way down to the forever hectic ER, he hurries past the coughing and wounded to the thankful tranquility of the small examination room in which he had left his young ex-employee to wait out the after-effects of the local anesthetic.

_I suppose she's not even really 'young' anymore... She's all grown up and doing her own thing..._

He rolls his eyes as he recognises this inner monologue to be uncharacteristically paternal, but adopts a small smirk when he turns from the white washed door to find Cameron lying curled up on her side upon the unyielding leather of the examination bed, her eyes closed and her lips slightly parted. Limping over quietly, his smirk widens into a full blown grin as he notes his Gameboy has been discarded on the windowsill, and he's willing to bet just about anything she hasn't even turned it on.

"Typical."

His mirth falters slightly as he is faced with the realization that it lies with him to wake her, and there is something awkward about this simple task which he imagines has a lot to do with the untold number of accidental touches and lingering glances shared over her fellowship. Discarding such thoughts with a brisk shake of his head, he clears his throat loudly, prodding at her unceremoniously with his cane.

"Rise and shine, Cinderella."

"...You mean Sleeping Beauty..."

The blonde mumbles, rolling over onto her back with an awareness of the narrow bed which is curiously impressive. House smirks as he watches her rub sleepily at her eyes, silently noting the way she favors her left side, keeping her right arm close to her body.

"A little presumptuous of you, don't you think, Dr Cameron?... Vain, at best."

"Cinderella wasn't the sleeping one..."

"Well, she must have slept at _some_ point."

"Fine... Cinderella... Whatever makes you happy, House."

Pushing herself up so that she sits perched up on the bed, the young doctor regards him nakedly, having rubbed away the minimal hint of mascara applied early that morning. As always, when faced with familiar complicated green, House finds himself at a loss of just what to say, and so compensates by prodding at her dangling shins some more with his stick.

He imagines it is a sign of the times when all this gets him is the arch of her brow.

"Ready to go?"

"Yeah, I just need to grab my stuff."

House nods as she lowers herself down tentatively, watching as she tests her weight on her right leg.

"Still feeling numb?"

"Not too bad, a bit tingly, but that's all."

"Enjoy the tingle it while it lasts."

Rolling her eyes, Cameron makes her way for the door; her gait only slightly hindered as she keeps one leg straighter than the other, and the graying doctor imagines he only notices due to his knowledge as to the events of the afternoon.

He refuses to entertain the fact that he notices simply because it's Cameron.

They make their way down the hallway in companionable silence, the hospital relatively quiet, bar the ER, due to the late hour. For this reason, House sees no qualm in following the blonde into the green-tiled locker room, in the same way that their time spent together while under House's supervision has the young doctor accepting this intrusion without word.

"You, uh, need any help?"

His voice is gruff as he takes a seat on one of the long wooden benches that center the room, his back to Cameron as she goes about stripping off her bloodied clothes and changing into a fresh set of jeans and a simple black sweater from her locker.

"Dream on..."

The loftiness to her tone does little to hide the blush his inquiry garners, in fact, if anything, such out of character arrogance only serves to bring attention to her uneasy reaction. Chuckling, House swivels round to regard her as she dons her jacket. Beckoning her over, he ignores the curious glance of a young nurse who enters the room, and edges up the soft wool of her sweater to check on the stark white patch of gauze strapped a little above the sharp peak of her hip bone. He pretends not to notice the way she holds her breath, and simply lowers black fabric back over pale flesh, content that the gauze remains pristine and free from blood.

"Ready?"

"...Yeah."

* * *

Waiting for Cameron to slip into the passenger side to his car- his bike at the shop fortuitously- House cranks up the heating, blowing dust off the infrequently used vents. He rarely feels the cold, a veteran to short sleeved t-shirts despite the often biting New Jersey weather, but he acts on instinct; recalling the almost constant use of the office radiator while Cameron had worked beneath him. As if on cue, she shivers slightly as she falls into the seat next to him, and he rolls his eyes but resists making a sarcastic quip about her skinny build.

_I don't know why, but I think those were the ones that really got beneath her skin..._

"I was expecting you to be on your bike."

"Ah, I can only imagine the disappointment you must be feeling knowing that this trip is going to involve minimal bodily contact."

"Well I don't think we'd get very far if I sat in your lap."

House raises an eyebrow, her blasé response to his sarcasm surprising him, and he reminds himself that she's had three years to feed off of his bleak humor.

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained..."

She throws him a mischievous smile and he returns with a burlesque wink.

"So where are you taking me for dinner, then?"

"The deal was you had to beat my best score for me to take you out."

House watches out of the corner of his eye as she sighs and shakes her head, grinning as she focuses her attention on the passing scenery.

"Oh alright, but only because I've always professed that you need feeding up. Buckle up, kid, things are about to get wild."

The blonde chuckles, rolling her eyes with ill-hidden amusement.


	3. Chapter 3

"Seriously..."

Cameron asks with a sigh, but she fails to hide the twitch of amusement tugging at the side of her mouth. Raising an eyebrow as House turns to regard her while killing the engine, she simply shrugs when he asks her where she had imagined he would be taking her.

"Cheap and easy..."

She imagines her ex-employer is just dying to finish this sentence with some small quip about her being the same, but, despite their friendly banter throughout the day, it has been a while since she's spent this much time with him and she imagines it is this awkwardness rather than any consideration for her feelings which keeps him from teasing her quite so ruthlessly as he once had.

"Are you insinuating something?"

She hisses, and again, House looks to the blonde with mild surprise; wondering where in the hell his meek little girl has obtained such blasé sarcasm from all of a sudden. He almost asks her- although, of course, he plans to suggest this is a negative trait simply to irk her- but he's afraid that she'll actually have an answer.

He finds he falters when Cameron does not.

Offering her a mere grunt in response, he turns away and makes his way over towards the warmth of the all-night McDonalds looming over them, the blonde following him amiably enough.

Once inside, House asks what Cameron wishes to order and tells her to go find a table- not that the place is packed in the _slightest_ at this late hour.

He's just unsure what the hell to say to her.

When she proceeds to falter and ask him what they serve, he turns to her incredulously, shaking his head and pulling at her wrist to walk her closer to the glaring billboards displaying salt bejewelled calories.

"What the hell do you mean, 'what kind of stuff do they have'? It's McDonalds!"

She shrugs, bright eyes scanning the boards apprehensively as she strives to find the least unappealing option.

"I guess I'll have a garden salad and a soda."

She reaches into her back pocket to pull out a small, folded wad of notes, but House waves his hand irritably and tells her to go and sit down.

When he returns, the blonde rolls her eyes when he proceeds to dump a tray laden with fries and a burger before her unceremoniously.

"They ran out of salad."

"Odd... I'd imagine it would be one of the less popular choices..."

She smirks, before directing her gaze pointedly to the counter where a small artillery of greenery sits sweating beneath the harsh lights of the counter.

"Just eat."

House sighs, already halfway through his bacon and cheese, his mouth full as he grumbles at her. Watching as she tears open a small sachet of sauce with neat, white teeth, her can't help but smirk as she creates a little dipping pool at the very edge of the grease-spotted paper belonging to her unwrapped cheeseburger.

"Very pretty."

She offers him a long-suffering sigh, but her eyes sparkle as she reddens the end of one of her slightly anaemic looking fries and nibbles at it thoughtfully.

"Oh, god."

"What?"

"Are you seriously going to eat those one by one?"

"... Well, I could try the whole 'stuff as much as possible into my mouth, who cares about breathing' thing, but I'm afraid I'm not quite as skilled at that as you are..."

"You're such a girl."

"Observant, you must be a doctor."

"Ah, but it's always best to double check these things; get a concise diagnosis..."

He waggles his eyebrows at her and the blonde groans, inwardly hoping the blush she feels creeping across her cheeks isn't painfully obvious.

"You're blushing."

"... Am I?"

"Which mean's you're either hiding something- perhaps taping it to your leg to keep it discreet- or you're imagining yourself spread eagle on an examination table while I-"

"- So how _did_ you get so adept at stuffing things into your mouth without gagging?"

"... Ooh, Dr _Cameron_ , was that an _innuendo_!? Look at you with your big girl insults!"

Placing his hand over his heart with mocking pride, House grins as the young doctor glares at him. Deciding to quit while they're both ahead- and refusing to dwell on the fact that a greasy dinner with the injured young woman is so far proving to be much more successful than the disastrous date he'd agreed to all those years ago- House sits back and licks the salt from his fingers childishly, watching as the blonde picks at her food with little interest.

"I'm pretty sure these lovely people would like to go home at some point..."

She glances up at him in confusion and he points to the untouched burger and litter of fries rapidly cooling in front of her.

"I'm full."

"You barely ate anything!"

She offers him a warning glance and he sighs, leaning forward to pluck up the luke-warm cheese burger and taking a bite, chewing loudly. He watches with interest as wrinkles her nose at the sight.

"One little trip to McDonalds isn't going to have you struggling to squeeze your little ass into your slacks tomorrow."

"I _know_ that, I'm just full."

The blonde's customary warmth suddenly drops by several degrees and House frowns, attempting to skate over what he knows to be a touchy subject- and yearns to know _why_ \- with sarcasm.

As is always the way.

"And besides, if you _were_ going to put on weight- which I'm all in favour of- the ER is the perfect place to be working! I have often wondered just what the differences are between scrubs and maternity pants..."

"Besides the colour?"

"Ah, I'm sure there are some women out there who rock the baby-pink... Looks alright on you..."

"... Yes... Well..."

Cameron sighs, hating herself for the small smile that threatens to alight her lips at such a weak compliment.

 _But this is House... He could commend you on_ anything _and you'd be putty in his hands..._

She frowns, knowing this to be true and despising the fact.

"Something wrong?"

The greying doctor looks at her with genuine curiosity and she shrugs uncomfortably.

"No, just thinking..."

"Oh, _that's_ what that disconcerted frown was for! Don't worry, it get's easier over time."

Green eyes roll and blue orbs sparkle as House leans forward to steal a handful of fries.

"I did always wonder though..."

His tone is suddenly free from jovial teasing, and the blonde looks up at him curiously, sipping at the sweet fizz of her soda.

"About what?"

"About you."

"...What about me?"

"There's been two times you've been angry with me... I mean _really_ angry, not just PMSing."

"Is PMSing code for having to deal with your constant _shit_ on a daily basis?"

"... Two times that I wondered if you'd walk out. One of those times you did, if you remember?"

"Of _course_ I remember! And I had every _right_ to! You scape-goated me! You-"

"-Ah, I never said I _disagreed_ with your actions... And, if you remember, I was willing to go quite some distance to get you _back_..."

"... You were."

"The other time... The other time you looked at me and I knew you weren't just pissed off, but you were _livid_... And not _just_ livid... You were upset too..."

"When was that? It sounds like after most differentials..."

"The little girl you were so sure was being abused- _one_ of the little girls you were so sure was being abused- back when the wombat was still sniffing after you... You made a comment as to how if menstruating could give you cancer that you should be in chemo at the time..."

"I remember."

"And I said-"

"-You told me that was ridiculous as I was much too skinny to be menstruating..."

"I did... And you-"

"-And I got pissed off because, believe it or not, it gets kind of tiring having people comment on your size all the damn time, especially your boss!"

"Ah yes, I can see how that could be the case... Only, I teased you for so many _other_ things also... _Worse_ things... And yet it was always the comments pertaining to weight that would get a rise out of you."

"... What do you want me to say?"

"Nothing. I imagine you'll say nothing. I was just curious..."

"You're _always_ curious."

"And _you're_ always evasive."

"Yes, well, excuse me for not wanting to give you the ins on my life up until now... Sometimes there's just really nothing to it, House... I can only tell you that I have never had any complications or problems with my weight, with my body, with my heath _so_ many times. It makes me less interesting, I know... If you remain determined to believe otherwise... Well, that's _your_ deal."

"Fair enough."

House nods, and the blonde sighs; frustrated to have what had been a curiously enjoyable evening flawed so easily- so _predictably_ \- but she supposes she should expect such altercations between the two of them by now.

"... I don't like mayonnaise."

"...Okay... I don't-"

"-I didn't mention it the first time you brought me up a sandwich because I didn't want to be rude... After that, I felt like if I told you _then_ that you would make fun of me for being so pathetic that first time... Nothing to do with wanting to be small- I just am- I just don't like it... Or food- particularly burgers- which have it in..."

"That... Is one of the saddest things I've ever _heard_!"

House confides gleefully, grinning as the blonde shakes her head in mock despair; inwardly thankful that the uncomfortable tension between them has been lifted.

_Somehow I imagine there's more to it, Cameron, but to use your term of phrase... I guess that really is 'your deal'._

"So what _else_ have you been lying to me about?"

"I wasn't _lying_ -"

"- Oh your tongue is positively _dripping_ with sin- of multiple varieties, at least in my head- 'fess up!"

"Oh god..."

"Plain old 'House' will do just fine."

"You're impossible..."

"No, I'm improbable, if I were impossible then you would be sat here talking to yourself, lamenting society's use of mayonnaise."

She laughs huskily and he joins in- bright eyes trained on pretty white teeth and delicate bone structure- before realising just who he sits across from and how peculiar it should be that they are getting along in such a way. That he should be getting along with _anyone_ in such a way.

_Ah, but then Cameron always was the exception. Always the one you had a little bit of a-_

_-No... Enough of that._

"Well, I'd better get Cinderella off home before she turns into a pumpkin."

"Cinderella didn't turn into a pumpkin..."

"Pity... That could have been the highlight of my diagnostics career"

"Or just a sure sign that you've finally lost it..."

She giggles, and House looks away, uncomfortable by just how strongly he is suddenly struck with the urge to ask her once again if she will consider coming back to work for him... After all... She is a brilliant doctor.

_And I miss her._

"Get your coat."

Hard, gruff, disinterested.

She regards him cautiously at this sudden change of tone but says nothing, simply donning her jacket and pushing herself out from the table. The action is swift- automatic- and it is only when she receives a sharp bite to her side that she remembers the reason they are out together in the first place.

"Alright?"

Hard blue like winter ice trains critically on the hand which has moved to clutch at her side. She nods, offering him a smile that is just a little bit too wide as she surreptitiously attempts to deduce if she's ripped any stitches. She doesn't think she has- House's sutures intricate and flawless- but this in itself has her pondering just why a brief movement should cause such a sudden pain.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

Straightening up, she gives a nonchalant shrug and follows him out into the biting cold New Jersey air as they trudge towards his car, oblivious to the purple thunder seeping delicately beneath taut, pale flesh.


	4. Chapter 4

"You did _what_?!"

Wilson cries, his eyebrows in danger of disappearing into his hairline. House grumbles at the gleeful lilt to his friend's voice, eyes trained on the ball spinning on the desk as he repeats himself irritably.

"I took her out for dinner."

""Oh, House, after _everything_ , are you sure that's really the best plan? To start taking Cameron out on-"

"-I'm not starting to _do_ anything. I drove her home and she said she wanted food, that's all there is to it."

"That's _never_ all there is to it with you... _Or_ her."

"Fine, fine, if you _must_ know; we waited for the lovely waitstaff of that ever prestigious establishment to look away and then I pulled her into the disabled toilets and we-"

"-House! God, please stop!"

The oncologist begs, his eyes alight with good humor. Leaning back in his chair and steeping his fingers beneath his chin thoughtfully, he continues in a more serious tone.

"I'm just glad she's alright... Must have been pretty frightening for her."

"Well, you know Cameron.

"Not all that well..."

"She can hold her own, despite what the itsy bitsy proportions and hooker-blonde hair might tell you."

"Oh, please, you were practically _drooling_ when you saw her when she came back-"

"- Well, she reminded me an awful lot of a young pole dancer named Lacey who I-"

"- Who you _nothing_."

"Whatever. Cameron's fine, that's the main thing."

"And yet, why do I sense you're ever so slightly disappointed there's no need for a few diagnostic tests to confirm that?"

"I'd enjoy sticking needles in my ex fellow?"

"You'd get to spend more time with her..."

"I'm still relishing the fact I got _rid_ of her!"

"You _didn't_ get rid of her; she quit."

"Best thing that's ever happened to me!"

"...Is this little act for _my_ benefit, because I doubt you're even fooling yourself."

House rolls his eyes, placing the ball back on its stand and regarding his friend levelly.

"It was time for a change... If it had just been Cameron left over and myself... She needed to go, and she knew that. If she hadn't given in her resignation, I would have had to _make_ her do so."

"You wouldn't have fired her. Not Cameron."

"...No. Which is why I'm glad she was smart enough to walk out of her own accord."

"And the others?"

"No regrets."

"Didn't think so."

"... Anyway. Whatever... Quit trying to psychoanalyse me... Do you think I have a shot with Thirteen?"

"Not all of your protégées are quite so enamored with crippled, age-inappropriate men."

"... You're right; I have a much better chance with Kutner."

* * *

"Is Dr Cameron about?"

"Allison's not come in yet; reckon she might be sick."

The harried nurse quips over her shoulder as Wilson moves quickly out the way of an oncoming orderly.

"Sick?"

The oncologist's brow furrows, deeming the blonde to be ill enough to skip work highly unlikely. Hell, the girl had refused to take the day off despite a damn HIV scare...

"Probably. Don't know. Wouldn't blame her for taking the day off; things got pretty nasty with a patient in here yesterday-"

"-Yes, I heard about that-"

"-She's not here though, and _believe_ me, I'd know! We could do with an extra set of hands!"

"Alright, thanks Nancy."

Nodding his farewell, Wilson frowns as he goes of in search of one of the hospital's other immunology specialists with his patient's case file, making a mental note to inform House of the young blonde's absence.

* * *

"Shit."

Cameron grumbles, lowering herself carefully into the empty bathtub and hissing through her teeth at the biting chill of enamel on flesh. Resting with her back against the gentle slope of the bath, she frowns as she looks down on the dark bruising emanating from below blood-soaked gauze. Gritting her teeth, she plucks gently at the tape holding the patch in place and peels it aside with a sharp intake of breath.

"Damn it, damn it, damn it..."

Touching the raw flesh surrounding black sutures with a grimace, she groans as she confirms her suspicion that several of the neat little stitches have been torn away with her movements the previous evening. This does little to appease the disconcerting feeling that has been plaguing her since early this morning however, as it doesn't serve to explain the deep bruising livid beneath pale flesh.

"Didn't nick anything vital for survival... "

She wipes at her forehead with the back of her hand, her flesh clammy since awaking this morning and her head woozy. She is aware that the most sensical solution to her current predicament would be to contact the hospital and get herself looked at, but she is unable to shake her pride which continues to admonish her with 'you're a goddamned doctor; act like one.'

That, and she doesn't want House to find out.

Doesn't want to be his fragile little girl once again.

"Suck it up, Allie."

Reaching for the first of the implements gleaming sharply on the side of the tub, she hovers the scalpel tentatively over House's neat, regimented sutures before biting her lip and snipping them cleanly away.

"Well, that was the worst part, surely..."

Her breath comes out in short, strained pants, and she scolds herself irritably as her slim frame quakes with them. Wiggling her fingers in their sterile latex gloves, she proceeds to place her index fingers on either side of the open incision and pulls the flesh ever so slightly apart.

"Come on, come on, you're fine, you're all good."

Applying just a little more pressure, she inspects the damage critically; brow furrowed as blood trickles lazily down her hip and begins to drip methodically against the stark white enamel.

"Oh, hush..."

Shaking a little, she grabs the small penlight resting beside her and twists the end to ignite its strong, narrow beam of light. Clenching it between her teeth, she leans forward, eyes watering as a sharp pain bites at her side.

"No... no, no, _no_."

Her words muffled by the metal of the penlight, she shakes her head in frustration, almost sure she understands just what the problem is. Closing her eyes, she takes a deep breath, aware that her knees are shaking against the cool sides of the tub and that her position is spilling scarlet blood down her stomach to soak into the grey cotton of her underwear. Forcing herself to continue with her- albeit primitive- examination, she pulls at broken flesh once more, staining the tips of her gloves maroon.

"Crap."

Resting her head back against the tiled surface surrounding the bath, she lets out a sigh of frustration, wondering why in the hell bad things happen to good people. She is frustrated; sure that whilst not nicking anything vital to her survival, the scalpel _has_ nicked her ovarian artery. She doesn't believe the artery to be severed, as such trauma would have been obvious to both herself and House when the graying doctor had come to her aid, but she suffers serious apprehension due to the lividity of the bruising surrounding the incision.

Using the scalpel to carefully remove the broken stitches altogether- deciding she'll have to redo them while figuring out just what to do- she jumps as a loud knock echos through her apartment.

" _Ah!_ "

Eyes widening as the lazy trickle seeping down her pale flesh turns suddenly dark and fast, she shakes her head in childish denial as fresh blood spills over the fingers she presses instinctively to the wound.

"Honey! You home?!"

Chase's voice comes as a muffled drone as he knocks out another little rhythm on the peeling paint of her front door. Looking down at the gore painting her gloves and deciding this takes presidence over the fact that she sits in just her underwear, she calls out; her voice breaking a little as she struggles to raise it enough to be heard by her ex-colleague.

"Chase! It's open! I... I can't... Please!"

Holding her breath she waits nervously as silence succeeds her plea, before she makes out the telling click of the front door to her apartment being pushed open.

"Allison?"

"In the bathroom."

"Uh..."

"I think... I think you might need to call an ambulance."

Brow furrowing, the young surgeon hurries towards the blonde's bathroom; the door cracked open just enough to make out a sliver of light."

"Cam, what the hell are you... Shit."


	5. Chapter 5

_"Cam, what the hell are you... Shit."_

Staring down at the blonde as she bites her lip with her hand pressed to her side- her glove streaked scarlet and her complexion pale- Chase freezes for a moment in sheer shock, before snapping out of it and falling down to kneel beside the tub. He wrestles himself out of his jacket and folds one of the sleeves hurriedly, moving the young doctor's trembling fingers out of the way before pressing the fabric to her wound.

_Hardly the most hygienic of compresses, but it will do for now._

"What the hell happened?!"

"I don't know... You knocked and I jumped, and I guess- I think the scalpel slipped and I- I don't-"

"What where you doing with a damn scalpel in the first place?! _Jesus_ , Cameron! Come on, come here-"

Grabbing the blonde's arm and draping it over his shoulders, Chase helps her clumsily from the bath, trying his best to ignore the splashes of crimson smeared up the enamel of the tub in a way which inexplicably has him thinking of a slaughter house.

_Doctor or not, when it's people you know... You're never immune to raw emotion._

He guides her with some difficulty from the bathroom to her couch in the living room; imagining she will later have to replace the cream throw on which he places her, but deciding she can worry about that some other time.

_Preferably at a time when she no longer bleeds quite so profusely._

Taking a seat next to her and keeping the drenched sleeve of his jacket pressed firmly to her skinny hip, the surgeon fishes his phone out of his jeans pocket- silently lamenting the way this unseasonably warm evening has taken such a turn; his original intention being to share a drink or two with the young immunologist at their local bar- and dials for an ambulance.

He informs the faceless voice on the receiving end of the younger doctor's injury, instructing that Cameron be taken to Princeton Plainsboro. He frowns as the blonde shakes her head distractedly- muttering something about Jersey General- and hangs up after confirming an ambulance is on its way.

"No, no, I need to go to General, I don't want to-"

"-What? Why? Cameron, what were you _doing_?!"

Chase's eyes are wide and the blonde comes to the slow realisation that he has unlikely been clued in on the events of the previous day. This notion is confirmed by the protective grip around her shoulders and she sighs as she wonders when in the hell the boys- _her_ boys- will quit treating her like their goddamned broken princess.

 _Come on, Chase, give me a_ little _credit. If I'd done this on purpose I'd hardly have invited you in to relish the aftermath._

"...A guy got me in the side yesterday with a scalpel in the ER, and-"

"-He _what_?! Why didn't you _tell_ me?!"

"Well... I haven't _seen_ you, why would I?"

"...A guy stabs you in the side and you didn't get it looked at?! _Allison_! He could have punctured your kidney, or-"

"- Yes, _thank you_ , I have a medical doctorate with my name written all prettily across it just like you... House checked me out and patched me up."

"House 'patched you up'?"

"Well, he was down in the ER at the time so he just took me into one of the exam rooms..."

"But then what-"

"-It was fine last night, I mean, it hurt a _little_ , but he'd stitched me up and it seemed like it was all okay... I woke up this morning and the gauze was saturated, and I saw the bruising and... I was trying to check it out-"

"-Cameron!-"

"-Look! I just didn't want to have to go back and sound like I was complaining, or-"

"-What, and tell House he messed? You'd rather dissect yourself in the damned _bathtub_ then rub the _good doctor_ up the wrong way? You-"

"-He didn't mess up-"

"- _Oh, for god's sake_! You-"

"-In case you've _forgotten_ ; I'm a doctor, and _I_ didn't think it was anything more than a flesh wound _either.._. Whatever, okay, there's clearly some internal bleeding, and I assume its source could be a nick to the ovarian artery given the area and dispersal of the bruising and-"

"-And you're an idiot for trying to sort this out by yourself..."

Cameron scowls at him, the effect diminished somewhat by the thin sheen of perspiration that stands out on her forehead and the shallowness of her breath. Recognizing Chase's words as a simple statement, she sighs and rests her head back against the sofa.

"I guess so."

Matching her sigh with a slightly more humorous one of his own, the surgeon gives skinny shoulders a squeeze before relinquishing the task of pressing sodden material to pale flesh in favor of the blonde's trembling fingers, moving from the couch to her bedroom to find her something to wear.

"What are you doing?"

The blond grins at the irritable note in the younger doctor's voice, calling back over his shoulder

"Panty raid!"

"Pretty sure you've _seen_ my more interesting sets..."

Rolling his eyes at Cameron's choked attempt at a blasé response, he forgoes the top drawers of her dresser altogether, searching instead for a loose jersey or cardigan and some sweatpants; feeling a little odd going through her things despite their jocular back and forth.

 _Not that I have a_ clue _what she usually pairs with what..._

Settling for some dark gray yoga pants, he pulls out a large navy hoodie that zips up the front. He experiences an odd surge of emotion as he throws this latter item onto the bed; its size a pretty good indicator that it will have once belonged to a member of the opposite sex. It's not that he hasn't accepted the idea that the blonde has moved on- not that, in _her_ eyes, there had been all that much to 'move on' _from_ \- and must be sexually active, it's just that he is rarely recquired to think on it; Cameron not one to regale those around her with tales of what little social life she has.

_And that's perfectly fine by me._

Giving up on the hunt for a matching pair of socks- a little surprised that she hasn't got them all paired together in their respective drawer- he pinches two of a similar dark color and carries his spoils out into the living room.

"You, uh, need any help?"

The blonde frowns as she is reminded of House asking her the same question the previous evening, but she supposes in some ways it's a good thing that it's Chase of all people to find her; she has less of a wall up around him.

_I suppose once someone's seen you naked, they might as well help you get your socks on if needs must..._

The thought amuses her and she chuckles to herself, the surgeon regarding her with a raised eyebrow.

"Something funny?"

"No, I guess I'm just a little light headed or whatever."

Shrugging, she dons the proffered outfit gingerly, Chase helping her here and there; grinning as the blonde lets out several frustrated sighs when unable to move with the agility she'd like.

"Ever the perfectionist."

"Shut up."

* * *

"I thought you said it wasn't bad?"

"I did, and I one _hundred_ percent stand by that statement... What are we talking about?"

House raises an eyebrow as the oncologist takes a seat opposite him at one of the small booths in the lunch hall, stealing half of the meatball sub steaming on Wilson's plate.

"Cameron, the cut to her side."

"... It wasn't."

House shrugs disinterestedly, causing his friend to frown as he continues to muse.

"I guess she just needed time to get her head around it then... Unless she actually _is_ ill of course..."

"What are you muttering about?"

"No, nothing, I went down to the ER because I had some odd cell counts when we ran an allergy test on my patient and I wanted to get Cameron to look at them for me. She wasn't around and Nancy said she'd not shown up yet. I wondered if she'd got cut worse than I thought, but-"

"-She's not at work?"

"She wasn't when I checked."

"... Well, as you said... She might be sick."

House offers no further comment on the subject, simply looking down at his commandeered sandwich pensively. Recognising that they have reached the end of whatever discussion there is to be had as to the blonde's health, Wilson adopts the fresh topic of just how likely it is that the new receptionist in Paeds was, at one point, in possession of male genitalia.

And perhaps still is.

* * *

"Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!"

House yells as he throws yet another piece of gravel against the small window to the left of the large apartment building he knows to be Cameron's. He has already attempted the intercom at her front door, but received no answer. Frowning as he spots her car in its designated space, and pairing this with the dusky glow of tungsten emanating from her room, he limps back over to the front entrance and presses all six of the resident buzzers.

"Yes?"

Drawing a momentary blank as an age-cracked voice hails him from the grime encrusted speaker, he continues cautiously

"I seem to have lost my front door key, I-"

Raising an eyebrow when a telling buzz sounds loudly from the small intercom box, he wonders if he should inform Cameron of just how easily she might get broken into. He imagines he probably shouldn't; the blonde likely to adopt yet more anal habits than she already partakes in.

Heading up to her apartment, House mutters irritably at the internal monologue that continues to demand an answer as to just what in the hell he thinks he's doing here.

 _I can barely stand her when she's_ healthy _... Why on earth would I want to go witness the_ un _healthy version?_

Somehow, he finds the idea of the young immunologist clad in pyjamas and sporting a thermos of chicken soup to be both amusing and ludicrous.

_I'd imagine her immune system would be too afraid of the wrath of her mind to fall so averagly below par._

That said... The idea of him- of Dr House- checking up on any of his protégés, hell, _ex_ -protégés, is ludicrous also.

_But what if you missed something..._

Impossible. He's House.

Coming to a stop outside her door, he ponders the cream lacquer- just starting to peel around the handle- pensively, before raising a fist and knocking loudly.

"Come on, Cameron, I know you're home..."

He is surprised that she hasn't answered his attempts to contact her so far; not thinking the blonde to be the sort to relish such a trivial game of hide and seek.

"Let me in, or I'm using your spare key..."

Receiving no response, he rolls his eyes and pulls his shirt sleeve over his hand. Reaching up to feel along the ledge of her door frame beneath the hallway light, he smiles as a small glimmer of silver falls to land on the carpet.

_Always predictable._

"I'm coming in! This better not be some weird sex thing! I swear, if I find you on all fours wearing nothing but a-"

But his jovial mockery peters into silence as upon opening her apartment door he is met with nothing but eery silence.

"Cameron?"

His frown deepens; clocking the blonde's black leather jacket hung neatly over one of her kitchen chairs with her satchel resting on the floor beside it. Making his way slowly to her bedroom, he stands in the doorway with growing confusion as he notes the way her dresser stands pulled open in disarray; several socks and a white tank top littering the floor.

"Allison?"

Her first name feels foreign on his tongue, but he has run out of ways in which to use her last name without yelling at her angrily to quit fucking around already.

Limping irritably back into the living room, he uses his cane to smack open her bathroom door for good measure, despite now being certain he has the place to himself. Pausing as something catches his eye, he frowns, before crossing the threshold into the small, neatly tiled room and dropping his cane with a loud clatter.

"What...?"


	6. Chapter 6

Grabbing the sink for support, House absentmindedly acknowledges its peculiar placement to be the reason he remains on his feet as he continues to stare down at the mess coating the blonde's bathtub. Deep maroon splashes- some sickeningly smeared and streaked- create a stark contrast to the white of the tub, and, despite all of his years of medical practice, there is something about the four smudges of scarlet at the rim of the tub- something about the way that they look almost like the left overs of a handprint, _Cameron's_ handprint- that has him swallowing thickly as he rubs anxiously at his stubble.

_What the hell have you done?_

He is unsure whether such words are directed at the blonde or at himself; suddenly accosted with the internal demand to know how he could have been so damned _stupid_ to leave her all on her own after the events of the previous day.

 _It_ wasn't _stupid, she was fine, she said so herself!_

 _Yes, and we all_ know _how forthcoming Cameron can be about pain and personal issues..._

 _But she_ was _fine, it was just a nick, just a_ cut _... A_ deep _cut, sure, but nothing worth hanging around for..._

"Cameron!"

Stumbling from the bathroom, the graying doctor hurries back to the blonde's bedroom, circling the modest double bed and checking her closet. It's not that he imagines the young doctor might be hiding, he just doesn't think the civil decency to collapse in plain view would have been paramount in her train of thought. Coming up empty and limping into the living room, he checks behind her kitchen island, the little nook where she keeps her vacuum cleaner and ironing board, and behind her sofa.

Pausing as he circles the sofa, he plucks at stained wool with clenched teeth, the blood dark and dried, and no more preferable for it. Falling heavily onto the sofa, House tugs at his lip distractedly; at a complete loss of where the blonde could have got to.

And trying both to gauge and to deny the state _she_ must be in given the state of her apartment.

"Where in the hell are you?!"

He mutters, pulling out his phone and dialing her number. He had tried to call her back at the hospital- readying some disdainful excuse for doing so, lest she think he might simply be checking to see if she was alright- but had received no answer. Now, as the dial tone heralds him from the useless hunk of plastic in his hand, he frowns as he makes out a telling hum coming from her bedroom.

" _Fuck!_ "

And just like that, his phone smashes into several smaller pieces as he hurls it at her front door. Sighing at the useless remains of his anger, he supposes it would make sense for the blonde to have called for help given the amount of blood staining her tub.

Not that the young doctor has always made all that much sense.

_What the hell happened, Cameron?..._

_Why didn't you call me?_

_... You wouldn't have answered..._

Hating the truth in this last notion, he pushes himself from the sofa and limps defeatedly towards the young doctor's bedroom, deciding to hunt out her phone with the intent to call the hospital.

Spotting a small Nokia charging on a neat little bedside, House settles onto the grey cotton of Cameron's bedspread and brings it to life.

Two missed calls; his, and one from Nancy Pierce.

Miss I-Can't-Stand-The-Sight-Of-Blood-But-I'm-A-Doctor.

Two text messages; one from Chase asking if she has plans, one from Dominic.

' _What do you mean it wasn't the best day at work? Everything ok?-'_

Friend? More than that?

_'- BTW, are you coming down for Mindy's birthday or shall I just tell dad already that you're too busy? As always. Every year.'_

Brother.

Resisting the urge to read through any previous messages- Cameron's private and family life something she has forever kept suspiciously close to her chest- he scrolls through her contacts with a frown, before realizing the reason he can't find Cuddy's details might be due to the fact that the blonde probably hasn't saved her number under 'Party Pants'.

Scrolling back up to 'L', House jumps and fumbles with the phone at a sudden thud from the other room. Frowning and plucking his cane from the bed, he moves quietly, limping towards the source of the noise.

"Cameron?!"

The blonde lets out an uninhibited scream as she drops her coat and raises her hands in what is presumably supposed to resemble some form of defence. Catching her breath, she glowers at the graying doctor nervously, leaning on the backrest of one of the chairs surrounding her table for support.

"What the _hell_ , House!?"

"'What the hell'?! I should be asking _you_ the same question! I come over here and you're nowhere to be found and it looks like you've been slaughtering cute little woodland animals in your bathroom! I-"

"- I didn't answer the door so you _broke in_?!"

"I... I don't know why you're _surprised_..."

House shrugs irritably, his expression purposefully disinterested, but he allows his eyes to roam baggy fabric and chalky features as the blonde shakes her head with a groan and picks her coat up off the floor. Noting the ungainly, tentative way she goes about doing so, House sighs and moves towards the table, pulling out a chair and pointing to it.

"Sit."

"I'm not a child..."

She grumbles, but she does as she's told; the fatigue of the day overshadowing her irritation at her old boss. Sitting back and regarding House quietly as the older doctor takes a seat opposite her, she sighs when he seems suddenly more interested in the grain of the wood of the table rather than herself.

"What are you doing here?"

"Wilson said you weren't at work when he tried to find you."

"He needed me?"

Looking up and noting the concern written across the young doctor's face, House rolls his eyes.

"We were talking about _you_ , remember?"

"Actually, I thought we were talking about _you_ and why you broke into my house..."

"I wanted to finish what the guy in the ER started?"

Cameron chuckles weakly at this, and House swiftly reprimands the small voice in his head that pipes up merrily that she will always be the one to react to his bleak humour... Whether she always _appreciates_ it or not is another thing.

"Actually... It looks like _you_ tried to finish what the guy in the ER started... What happened?"

"When I woke up the dressing was soaked through and there was a lot of bruising... I recognised it for internal bleeding and tried to figure out what-"

"- You idiot!"

"I wish people would stop calling me that..."

"Well you are... It sounds like something _I_ would do."

"Well, I learnt from the best."

"Ah, flattery will get you nowhere! What-"

"- Chase came by to see if I was free for drinks and I figured I'd done all the damage I was willing to do... Went to the hospital, got myself sorted again- this time with some additional internal work- and... Good as new."

She smiles, and House fights the urge to demand she stop doing so as the effect only serves to exaggerate the pallor to her complexion and the tiredness in her eyes.

"Hardly."

"...Hmm... Rude."

Shrugging, House pushes himself from the chair, suddenly wishing to get as far away from the blonde as possible.

She is fine. She will be fine. He has no reason to stay.

 _But what if she_ hadn't _been..._

"I'm going to go. All this breaking and entering has got me beat."

"So wait, you broke into my house and you didn't even _want_ anything?"

House regards the blonde levelly, taking in the slight twitch to the side of her mouth and suddenly willing to bet anything that she's playing him.

Trying to get him to admit he had been worried about her.

"You were MIA, I wanted to solve the mystery."

"Uhuh... And your phone?"

She points to the fractured remnants scattered across the floor and he silently damns her for the sharpness of her mind despite her condition.

_But then, isn't that a huge part of her appeal?_

_What appeal?_

_Hmm... Smooth._

"Dropped it."

"Uhuh..."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"What?"

"That noise; 'uhuh', why the doubt?"

"...Nothing... "

Grunting in response, House nods and places his hand on the doorknob.

"You know, you could always stay around and help me cook..."

Raising an eyebrow, he looks first to the blonde and then down to his hand resting so tantalisingly on his means of escape.

"I, uh, my cooking's not-"

"-House, relax, I'm not trying to jump you. I just don't think I can reach the plates is all."

" _Ah_ , so you need the help of a big, strong man, Dr Cameron?"

"Well, that _would_ be preferable, but I suppose I'll settle for _you_ as you're here..."

"Want me to spit in your dinner?"

"I think I'll pass... But let's start with drinks before things get too crazy."

"... Perhaps I was wrong about you..."

"Oh, shut up. Top cabinet, whatever you like, mine's a gin and tonic. Glasses are above the sink."


	7. Chapter 7

"I'm making an executive decision."

"Really? What's that?"

The blonde raises a brow, but her expression remains otherwise serene; a small smile sitting contently on her lips.

House supposes this may be one of the reasons he feels the need to put a stop to the way things are headed; before they get out of control.

_You mean before they get too pleasant..._

He has spent the better part of the evening with his backside resting against the modest countertops that line her kitchenette while watching her go cautiously about making them dinner, moving every now and then to reach for anything on a higher shelf. She hasn't had to ask him to do so, he has just observed her casually, handing her the salt, the plates, the dried basil without any verbal request. Her tentative movements have intrigued him; every now and then expecting her to retire to the comfort of the chairs surrounding the table with the exhausted request that he finish her mission to feed them, but he supposes it stands true to character that she has created a fresh putanesca sauce from scratch despite the noticeable sensitivity to her side.

He has tried to brush off the few bumps of her hip against his while moving within the narrow space between stove and countertop, much as his long fingers brushing her sides have been purely in the interests of navigating around her small form in order to lean delinquently out of her way.

Now, offering Cameron a small grunt, he reaches across their empty plates- only the faintest smears of pasta sauce visible on either one- and plucks the half empty wine bottle from its place beside her fork.

"No more of the good stuff for you."

She sighs, resisting the childish urge to present him with a mocking pout, her eyes glittering as she watches him take a greedy swig from the bottle and wipe his mouth dramatically with the back of his hand.

"Uh... You realise this is _my_ apartment, right?"

Her tone is irritable, but he knows better than to take any notice. For one, he has little interest in her mood-swings, for another, it's Cameron; she'll never truly begrudge him anything.

_You shouldn't take advantage of that little notion... What if one day she proves you wrong?_

Impossible.

 _And even if I_ were _wrong- which I'm_ not- _what would it matter? It's not as though I care what she thinks..._

In the end, he simply shrugs in response to his ex-colleague's bitter inquisition, but his expression softens slightly when she continues to regard him cooly.

"I trust I don't need to explain the ramifications of combining alcohol with painkillers, _Dr_ Cameron?"

"I've had one glass!"

"And a gin and tonic, which is plenty."

She sighs as he smirks at her with smug superiority but doesn't argue back; feeling inexplicably flushed that he should look out for her in such a way- even if just for his own amusement- and deciding she doesn't wish to ruin the moment.

She can always rely on _House_ to do that.

"So, who's Mindy?"

"Who?"

"That's what I was asking _you_? Who is she and why do you hate her?"

"...I don't know who-"

"- At least, good ol' _Dom_ seems to think you do."

"Dom?... _Dominic_?! How do you-"

"- Passcode on your phone, Cameron; rule 101."

"What the _hell_?! You snooped-"

"-I did nothing of the sort, the message was simply on the screen when I opened it up."

"Why would you do _that_?!"

"Well, after the little accident incurred by mine, I was simply being resourceful."

"You had no right to use my phone!"

"Well, it's a little later to bicker about that _now._.. So... Who is she?"

Sighing, the blonde sits back in her chair; the fact that her hand moves to rest at her hip not going unnoticed by the older doctor. Nor the way her eyes linger longingly on the bottle.

Despite his earlier warning, House leans over and tops her glass up with a few fingers of merlot, an eyebrow raised in question.

Curiosity killed the cat.

"My step mom."

Cameron shrugs as though bored by the topic, but the tick at her jaw does little to aid her plight in this little pantomime.

House remains silent, knowing she will continue unless goaded.

"She married my dad when I was two. I don't hate her, I just don't... We don't get on. She's Dominic's mother."

The greying doctor frowns, rubbing at his scruffy jaw pensively.

"I knew you had a brother, but I was under the impression he was older than you."

"He is."

"... I may only be a doctor, but something doesn't add up there?"

"How observant of you. Almost as observant as my teachers were, and the girls' at schools mothers were on the topic."

"Ah."

"Mindy's not a bad person-"

"- You say that about _everyone_ -"

"- She could have put her foot down about dad taking me in and she didn't... But... Okay, so all the things you said to me when I asked you why you hired me, all that crap... Well, Mindy was of a similar opinion, only in _her_ eyes, the fact that I 'buried myself beneath books in the plight to become a socially inept know-it-all' was more of a negative thing. In fact, she took it pretty personally... She's a pageant coach."

"The world peace stuff doesn't appeal to you? You surprise me."

"Oh, it does. Vapid girls getting herded up on stage just to say those empty words however, does not. Also, I didn't have any _talent,_ as I was frequently reminded, so I guess it was a case of failure from the very beginning... Who knew being pretty could be such hard work?"

Cameron laughs lightly at this, but it is a harsh sound, and House watches her intently over steepled fingers.

"And now?"

"What do you mean 'and now'?"

"Now that you're not a little girl in a pretty garish frock, but a student of medicine who has worked beneath a man of myth, a man of _legend,_ is she-"

"- Is she happy for me? Is that what you want to know? Is she proud of me?"

"...Well?"

"I don't know... It's hard to tell really because most of the time I see her she's a little preoccupied fretting over the fact I remain unwed... And I'm almost _thirty_!"

The blonde opens her mouth in mock horror at this and House rolls his eyes, absentmindedly noting the way her lips are tinged slightly purple from the wine.

He imagines her tongue is too.

Sighing uncomfortably, he wonders if he is required to comment on what Cameron has just divulged to him. If so, he has no idea what to say; adept at cutting sarcasm, but suffering from the strange notion that now is perhaps not the time.

He decides to just go with what he knows.

"Actually, you're closer to twenty-five."

"I'm sorry?"

"If we're rounding off your age; you're closer to twenty-five."

"I'm twenty-seven."

"Yes, but it would be rounded up to thirty at twenty-seven and a half. It's only June."

She does some quick math, telling herself she shouldn't be so surprised that he knows when her birthday is. He would never _congratulate_ her, but he knows. Of course he knows.

"Oh good, that still leaves me some time then!"

House chuckles dryly at the mocked sincerity of her words, watching as she tips back the last of her wine.

"Lock up your sons and daughters, Allison Cameron's on the prowl!"

She almost chokes on her wine at this, glaring at him accusingly through watering eyes as she attempts to reign in her coughing laughter.

"House!"

He smirks wickedly, though his eyes flash down to her hand once more as she holds it to her side.

"I should leave; evidently I provide far too much comedy for one still healing... And you should get some sleep."

She rolls her eyes and pushes herself up carefully, stacking their plates and bringing them over to the sink to soak while House slips away to empty his bladder before he leaves.

* * *

Red.

Red.

Red.

It's not that he had forgotten the macabre scene in her bathroom, but when he switches on the lights his breath still comes in a sharp gasp.

_Things could have gone so wrong..._

_If Chase hadn't-_

_\- If Chase hadn't stopped by, she would have called the hospital; she's not an idiot._

Eyes flickering to the stained silver of the scalpel which sits forlorn against a streak of crimson has him begging to differ.

Despite preferring to do his business sitting down when in the privacy of the bathroom, he opts to stand.

This way he can turn his back to the tub and its hateful offering.

Zipping up and flushing, he limps back into the kitchen to find Cameron wiping down the countertops; long hair tumbling over the excessive folds in the hoody much too large for her.

"I'm going to go."

"Alright. Thanks for helping with dinner."

"Do you mean eating it? Because the cooking was all you."

"Yes, but I would have been plateless."

She smiles brightly, and he finds his mouth working of its own accord before he can stop it.

"Call me if you need to..."

The beat of silence she leaves before answering only serves to make things worse.

"... Thanks... Have a good night."

Offering a curt nod, the greying doctor slips quickly from her apartment.

Before he can say anything else moronic.


	8. Chapter 8

As they stroll down the hallway towards the elevator, House keeps quiet about his previous evening spent at the blonde's apartment; not wanting to discuss the matter with Wilson. As it is, the oncologist is full of tales about his own evening and he regales with a venom the greying doctor knows to take with a pinch of salt the story of how his ex-wife had deemed it entirely appropriate to show up for dinner unannounced. Slipping in a few sarcastic remarks here and there, House nods along without really listening, peeking stealthily through the glass doors to the ER as they pass; curious to see whether Cameron has come into work today.

Yes. Of course she has.

He is careful not to linger, simply taking note of pretty blonde curls and the pink flash of her scrubs. She has her back to the door, standing between a dark haired man in a lab coat and a stout young nurse, but, despite ditching the brunette waves she had shown preference when beneath his wing, he recognises her instantly.

Something in the way she stands perhaps.

House is sly in his observation, and Wilson remains oblivious; bidding his friend farewell as they reach the elevator and the taller man presses a button deftly with the tip of his cane. None the wiser as to House's uncharacteristically sociable home visit.

* * *

Cameron is a little less secretive.

The oncologist smiles as he spots the young doctor sat by herself in one of the booths at the far end of the lunch hall. For the blonde to be found dining alone is not uncommon; she is well liked by her team in the ER, but a woman perfectly at home in her own company. Wilson imagines it is for this reason she had so often simply spent her free time in the office, methodically trawling through paperwork when she had worked for House, rather than frequent the bustling food court.

Well. _One_ of the reasons.

Clearing his throat politely before slipping into the bench opposite her, he returns her predictably sunny smile with his own and points to the sandwich that sits barely touched on her plate.

"Mayonnaise?"

"Yeah."

"You know you can ask for it without, right?"

"I did, but, you know... They're busy, and I guess so many people are asking for different things..."

She shrugs, and the oncologist grins as what little he knows about Cameron is so irrefutably predictable it borders on amusing.

"And you didn't want to cause a fuss..."

"No."

Rolling his eyes amiably, Wilson offers her the apple from his own tray- an impulsive buy in a vague attempt towards his five a day- and she accepts it with a smile; white teeth sinking into scarlet flesh.

"Chips and an apple; a meal fit for a Queen."

He muses, glancing at the empty packet of Doritos folded neatly beside her plate.

"Just what the doctor ordered."

She agrees, chuckling as he groans at her pitiful attempt at comedy, before nodding when he gestures inquisitively towards her unwanted sandwich.

"Speaking of which, how are you doing? House told me what happened."

"Not too bad. Still a little sore from where they restitched me up, but it's ok if I don't move around too much. I'm just overseeing the interns today, so no real stress.

She says it as though she is being punished, and the oncologist decides that if ever there was to be a picture beside the term 'hardworking' in the dictionary, it would be of the blonde.

"Not quite your style? Still, everyone needs a rest now and then, Allison, I just hope you're being sensible when you get home! You should call on people to help you out and do your cooking and cleaning; make the most of your position."

He grants her a jocular wink and she smiles.

"Are you offering?! Oh my! First House, now you..."

She laughs amiably, while Wilson raises an eyebrow; suddenly curious.

"House?"

"Yeah, he came by mine when you told him I wasn't at work and he ended up helping me with dinner."

"... House... Checked up on you?"

"Well... I think it was more a case of worrying about his reputation as the all-knowing, legendary doctor being called into question than it was checking if I was _alright_..."

Cameron blushes, nibbling at her apple awkwardly as Wilson frowns.

_God, they're both just as bad as each other._

"Ok... But he cooked for you?"

"No, no, I cooked, I just asked if he would help so I could reach the plates and things that were high up."

"I see... So he stayed for dinner..."

"Well, yeah..."

"And then... He went home? Or?"

"Well, he's not going to have stayed about to read me a bedtime story..."

The blonde sarks, her tone irritable, but her cheeks a telling pink.

"No. Sorry. I just... He didn't tell me he'd been round to yours, that's all."

"Don't worry, I know he's your boyfriend, I won't touch."

Wilson rolls his eyes as the immunologist gives him a measured look, and he decides that no matter how irresponsible he may find the notion of House going after Cameron- he doesn't know her well enough to feel he can judge vice versa- the two are surprisingly well suited in their mannerisms.

"I don't think my heart could take it!"

She laughs at his theatric response, before glancing up at the large white clock that hangs above the food counter and excusing herself.

The oncologist watches on sympathetically as she moves with noticeable care.

* * *

"So that's twice in one week now..."

"Well, if you keep on at it and improve your aim, you'll be hitting the bowl _every_ time. Practise makes perfect."

"... Twice in one week that you've had dinner with Allison."

"Cameron?"

"... No... One of the _other_ Allisons you've been cooking for and taking out for dinner."

"I didn't cook, she did. She asked me to stay, and, being a kind and compliant human being, I merely consented to her wishes."

"Doesn't sound like you."

"She was offering me home cooked pasta, and I happen to know that she understands a thing or two about seasoning. It was a good offer compared to _this_."

House gestures towards the left overs of the Chinese takeout that sits before them on Wilson's coffee table.

"The food or the company?"

"Well, _she_ doesn't ask _nearly_ as many pointless and annoying questions as you... But you _do_ have childbearing hips."

"... Just be careful, House."

"Be careful? What of? Maybe you _are_ talking about another Allison, because the Cameron I know deserves about as much caution as a toothless puppy."

"You have a thing for her-"

"-No. I just find it bad manners to watch a woman bleed unassisted."

"Oh come on, you've _always_ had a thing for Cameron. Maybe not a crush, or an _interest_ or anything like that... But there's always been this... This..."

"Thing?"

"Yes!"

"She doesn't repulse me quite as much as the other two did and do, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that constitutes a 'thing'. Maybe just a 'th' at a push."

The oncologist rolls his eyes, uncomfortably aware of the brittle undertone to his friend's sarcasm.

He has a feeling he wasn't supposed to find out about the events of the previous night.

He's right.

"So what's the lovely doctor going around telling people, anyway?"

" _Nothing_ , House. I asked her how she was over lunch and she just mentioned you'd been over for dinner. It's not like she couldn't contain her excitement and blurted it out."

"... You had lunch with Cameron?"

 _Oh. You_ definitely _have a 'thing'._


	9. Chapter 9

As the night wears on, the two bottles that had stood as sentinels to grease speckled takeout boxes become four. Then eight. Then twelve. Wilson sips at his third while House nurses the dregs of his ninth; the graying doctor's eyes tinged red and his initial declination to discuss the events of the previous evening turning into an irritable commentary on Cameron's shortcomings.

He has managed to retell the tale of arriving at the blonde's empty apartment with a suitable dose of disdain for his ex-employee's stupidity, and scowls in frustration when the oncologist adopts a horrified expression as he gets to the part about the blood coating her bathtub.

"Jesus!"

"Idiot."

"Wow... I mean... What the hell was she _thinking_?!"

"Evidently she _wasn't_."

His words concerning the immunologist since then have been cruel, and Wilson imagines he has a fairly good idea why.

House is as private as he is proud.

She should never have mentioned their dinner.

The notion is ridiculous, as any sane person would surely agree, but he has known the man who sits slumped beside him for too long now to mistake him for falling into this category. Still, as House's words become ever more venomous towards the young blonde, the oncologist finds himself growing tired of listening to such sniping. He doesn't know Cameron intimately well, but he likes her well enough, and upon hearing about the injury she had sustained at her own hand he is somewhat disturbed.

Partly out of concern for the young woman.

Partly at the idea of she and House feeding off of each other's somewhat damaging sense of pride.

"Well, whatever, I think it's a good thing that you checked up on her..."

A glower, and House pushes himself from the sofa, muttering that Wilson would do well to shut up.

He limps outside to sit sullenly on the step by the front door, the evening air carrying a frigid bite, but no wind. He is dimly aware of the fact that the dull anger he feels towards Cameron is almost entirely unjustified; knowing the young doctor well enough to be certain she wouldn't have gone around confiding about their evening spent in each other's company to just anybody. What irks him is that she has told _Wilson_ , as it is the oncologist who forever decrees to hound him in regards to their peculiar relationship.

What irks him is that dinner with the blonde had actually been really quite, well, _pleasant_.

What irks him is that no matter how hard he has tried to push the young doctor away, she seems always to be on hand.

Always hopeful.

No. Not hopeful; that's not _entirely_ fair. Whatever flame she had once held for him has long since burnt out, and she has made no secret of that fact. She isn't the same doe-eyed little girl he had originally hired- a decision made more out of curiosity than anything else; her grades and recommendations no better than plenty of the other applicants- but nor has she entirely outgrown him as the other two have.

She had outgrown the _job_ , yes... But whereas Chase and Foreman have a _career_ as their only objective, Cameron has never endeavoured- nor failed, as in the case of the neurologist- to cut any ties. She has grown up, and she has _wisened_ up. What hidden bitterness she had once carried- a bitterness he had initially presumed to be a result of her husband's death- is now more apparent; the young immunologist forever kind and goodnatured, but laced with a peculiar hardness; a little like biting down on tin foil.

She is no longer his _little girl_... But there is a part of her that will always remain _his._

Whether he likes it or not.

And this evening he does not. He doesn't like it one bit.

Doesn't like the way his mind has kept wandering back to the skinny blonde since coming to her aid. Doesn't like the way she had scared him- actually _scared_ him- by not being home when he had broken in. Doesn't like the way his stomach flips when he thinks of the bloody smears that had tainted white enamel. Doesn't like the way she crawls under his skin like a parasite. Like a virus.

Doesn't like the way he can't just react how he imagines any _normal_ person would react to the fact that his initial dread had turned into a surprisingly pleasant evening on both sides.

That he can't just look back on their dinner and acknowledge it for the simple thing it had been to his own best friend.

He is plagued by his own parting words- his offer that she should call him should she need to- and the vulnerability they had lent him.

His mind flashes with the image of her lips- slightly purple from the wine he knows will have coloured her tongue should she have stuck it out for him- and the way she had spoken about her life in a hatefully intimate way.

He is angry.

He is angry with her for putting him in such a position.

He is angry with her for continuing to trust him when he continues to screw her over.

He is angry with her for being weak.

For treating him as though he were a friend.

His teeth feel numb and his face feels loose and he knows he's drunk, and that it's entirely her fault.

Getting up from the stoop and grabbing his cane from its resting place against the wall, it isn't until he walks two blocks and turns a right that he realises where he's going.

But then this is nothing new.

* * *

Raising an eyebrow in surprise as the metallic buzz of her intercom fills the room, the blonde places her wine glass carefully on the coffee table and turns down the corner of the page in her book.

 _Shouldn't do that, Allison, it ruins the paper. Just_ look _at the state of these! And, oh_ god, _girl, is that_ highlighter _?! What would you go and do that for?!_

Mindy's voice, not hers, and she cordially ignores it just as she had done all those years ago.

Padding curiously over to the small speaker by the door, she depresses the communication button after a brief pause.

"Hello?"

Static crackle but nothing more.

"Hello?"

"Ca...n"

She frowns; the voice on the other end so distorted that she doesn't quite catch enough to suss that the jumbled sound resembles her name.

"Um, this is Allie... Can I help you?"

"Allie... Allie? Really? _Ser-sly_... uckin'... cute..."

Brow furrowing deeper as she recognises the irritable grumbling despite the fractured delivery, she hesitates for a moment as she tries to get a handle on the situation before pressing the button on her end once more.

" _House_?!"

Receiving no answer, she merely rolls her eyes, before pressing the small silver button that centres the intercom to allow him to enter.

Hurrying to her bedroom to find some form of sweater or cardigan to cover the thin camisole she wears over her pyjama shorts, she is back at her door and peering out into the hallway by the time the telling thunk of the older doctor's cane alerts her to his imminent presence.


	10. Chapter 10

"What are you doing here, House?"

She inquires curiously as his shadow casts an ominous figure onto the communal landing, before being proceeded by the man himself.

He frowns as her voice alone seems only to feed his current anger; characteristically good-natured and full of intrigue rather than showing any signs of annoyance at being disturbed at this unsociably late hour. Regarding her irritably, the graying doctor takes in Cameron's attire with a scowl; her slim legs bare beneath flimsy cotton shorts, with that ever vexing gap between them that is somehow so ridiculously childish.

Frustratingly innocent.

Moving towards her silently, it registers as yet another point against her in his current state of mind that it is only when he towers- somewhat threateningly- over her that her polite smile falters slightly; replaced by a quizzical look of incomprehension.

She steps back and lets him in.

"House?"

"Why did you do it?"

"Do what?"

"Why did you tell Wilson you cooked me dinner?"

"I... Well... I mean, it just came up... I hadn't realised I wasn't supposed to..."

She adopts her own small frown as she turns to face him and closes the door behind them.

"You came all the way here just to ask me why I mentioned last night to _Wilson_? Did you drive? Are you drunk?"

Her last question is fairly rhetorical; she can smell the alcohol on him from where she stands several feet away.

"Am I-... _God,_ you really are _insufferable_ , you know that?!"

Pretty, green eyes blink rapidly, and the pleasant curve of the blonde's mouth falls as she takes a step back, her ass hitting the door. House rolls his eyes; the hurt expression that crosses her sharp features nothing new. Sighing, he battles with himself as he realises he doesn't really have much of a _clue_ what he's doing here.

_I came because you've been plaguing my thoughts and conversations ever since that asshole took a stab at you- ha- and I watched your- oh so perfectly, innocently pink- scrubs blossom scarlet and some idiot part of me decided to lend a hand._

_I came because I want you to get_ angry _with me for barging in on your evening only to speak to you in a way any normal person would have long since despised me for._

_I came because I want to know if the wine colors your tongue the way it does your lips._

Of course, he can't tell her _any_ of these things.

Instead he simply out stares her.

"I... I was just asking... Look, it's getting late and I have to work tomorrow, as do _you_!... Only _I_ actually have to be there on _time_... So if you wanted something, or needed anything then that's cool, but... If you've just come here to argue about last night then that's... Well, that's pretty shitty of you, really..."

 _'Pretty shitty'? And you're_ surprised _, Dr Cameron? Do you possess any recollection of the past four years at_ all _?_

Despite his irritable internal monologue, House's shoulders droop slightly as he takes in the way she crosses her arms over her chest and eyes him warily; clearly upset but also defeated, and he cant help but wonder why he feels the constant need to do this to her.

_Because she lets you?_

Ah, there is that.

Sighing deeply, he looks down at his cane so that he doesn't have to maintain eye contact; addressing her gruffly.

"Wilson looks into things... I'd rather not receive lectures on my feelings towards you and how to deal with them."

"...Your feelings towards me?"

"Ah, they exist only in _his_ head, Dr Cameron, before you go getting all gooey on me. Personally I find you just about tolerable, bordering on annoying, but it has always proven rather difficult to shatter his delusion."

"Yeah, well, you didn't need to come all the way here to tell _me_ that... Wilson asked me if you'd, uh, 'stayed over' after dinner... I told him no, before you ask... And to answer the question you seem reluctant to bring to the table; yes, I am _fully_ aware that you're not interested in me... There's only so many times you can be told 'no', before you have to just grin and bear it or buy a bunch of cats."

He raises an eyebrow at this last part and she offers a small smile despite the animosity shrouding his previous words towards her.

_And this is why people fuck you over, Cameron, because you goddamn let them._

Giving in to her obvious desire to sweep whatever irritation he currently suffers under the carpet, he looks around her cosy apartment theatrically, before glancing back up to meet arresting green.

"No cats..."

"No."

"And yet, you're not grinning..."

"Ah, well it was a long time ago, and I've found _another_ way of dealing with your heartbreaking rejection."

"Sleeping with Chase?"

A warning glance, but she says nothing on that particular little situation, opting instead to simply make her way back to the sofa and pointing to the half empty glass that rests on the coffee table.

"Wine."

This finally earns her a small smirk, and House limps a little closer to regard her pensively.

"Should I feel guilty that I have driven my ex-employee to drink?"

"It would be rather presumptuous of you to take all the credit... But even if that _were_ true, it's not like you _would_."

"Your words _hurt_ , Cameron!"

"I know the feeling."

Blunt, truthful, simple.

There is no anger in her tone, but nor is there any joviality, and he merely nods, accepting that it is what it is.

"So what now?"

She asks, taking a sip of plum purple Merlot as his crystal blues study the act intently. She sits slumped back on the sofa in an oddly teenage fashion, and he ponders not for the first time how misleading her looks can be. At work, dressed smartly and donning a little makeup, she passes for about twenty five which is close enough, but the few times he has come calling on her when on her own territory, he has found her clad in hoodies, shorts or jeans and barefaced, her resultant appearance unsettlingly youthful.

_It's her goddamn legs; I'd bet if not for her height she'd have no trouble shopping in the kiddie department._

"What now?"

"Well... It's getting on for midnight and I can tell from the way you're standing you're in p-... Walking back to yours may not be the best idea..."

"You're off the clock; I don't need a doctor."

"No, but I'm allowed to express my opinion."

She shrugs, and he supposes that from anyone else such a statement would serve to irk him, but he is somewhat glad to catch a hint of backbone from her after the wounded expression she had offered him earlier.

"... Fine."

"You're welcome to stay here..."

"And after you _just_ told me you were over me! Now you're trying to get me into bed for some hardcore S &M, you-"

"-Just the bed part, and I won't be in it, so you don't have to worry. This is a sofa bed."

"Yeah, you never struck me as one for bondage."

"Oh, I don't know; it's always the quiet ones."

Raising an eyebrow, House regards her curiously; not sure if this is her seemingly newfound sassiness showing through, or if she is simply stating a fact.

It wouldn't be the first time she has come out with a little nugget of information that has thrown him.

_"If you ask me, if two people really trust each other, a threesome once every seven years might actually help a marriage."_

"Oh?"

A grin, and a brief flicker of her tongue through pretty, white teeth, and he discovers that it is indeed tinged purple from the wine.

"One should never presume."

"No... I suppose one mustn't"

He smirks, her ostentatious wording tickling him, while his mind serves him up several less than professional images of the young blonde he waves firmly aside.

Watching as she drags the coffee table neatly into the corner, he tells himself not to stare at her ass when she bends over the sofa to pull out the bed with a few brutal yanks.

He is almost successful.

"Need help?"

She turns to roll her eyes at him; having quite clearly finished the job.

"How gentlemanly of you."

But her lips twitch with a smile, and she pads off into the corner to open up a narrow closet from which she pulls a navy blue quilt and cushion.

"I try."

"Hmm... Perhaps I have found the one thing at which Dr Gregory House is doomed to fail..."

"Hey, I took you to dinner didn't I?"

"Mhmm, and I must say I'm mildly touched you didn't order me a happy meal..."

"Not _that_ dinner. The one you were so keen on begging me out on before-"

"- Okay."

She stops him swiftly, offering him a weary glance, and he supposes he has jabbed at her one too many times in regards to her previous affections.

Well... At least for tonight.

"You know where the bathroom is..."

_Red, red, red._

_Have you cleaned up your scarlet idiocy?_

_Of course you have..._

_You're Cameron._

"I do."

"And before you insult me with the question; no, I will not be mentioning this little sleepover to Wilson."

Grinning at her suddenly irritable tone, House simply nods; secretly thankful that she seems set on leaving him to it as the beer is beginning to take its inevitable effect of making him drowsy.

"Just so we're clear."

One last snide comment, and he smirks as she rolls her eyes and turns for the bathroom; his gaze falling to long legs as she leaves.

"Goodnight, House."

"Yeah."

His answer is little more than a grunt, and she shrugs as she shuts herself away, leaving him standing alone in the middle of her living room.

_And thank god for that; if Wilson only knew where I was right now, his head might explode!_


	11. Chapter 11

_Roused by a gentle dip in the rather worse-for-wear, cardboard-like mattress on which he slumbers, House rolls slowly onto his side to find himself accosted with tousled blonde; his newfound bedmate lying with her back to him and saying nothing._

_He is_ sure _she must only just have joined him, or else what could have woken him?_

_Crystal blues trained sharply on the gentle slope of her shoulder, he notes that she has discarded the hoodie she had been wearing upon greeting him, in favour of a simple, white tshirt._

_And... There is something strange about that, but he can't quite place his finger on what exactly it might be..._

_"What are you doing?"_

_Low. Gruff. Emotionless._

_And he_ has _to keep his tone free from emotion, as right now he is crucially aware of her heat emanating towards him beneath the sheets, and the smell of her as light, cornsilk curls- sweet smelling, almost as though fresh from the shower- ignite some very inappropriate ideas in his head indeed._

 _But then, isn't_ she _the one who has crossed the line in crawling into bed with him?_

_"Cameron?"_

_No answer._

_No_ verbal _answer anyway, but he is certain he catches a low laugh; sure he feels her shake slightly with it._

_"What are you doing?"_

_A little more curious now, waiting for an answer, but still she keeps her teasing silence._

_And this time, this time he_ knows _she's chuckling playfully at his expense._

 _And fuck it, why does she have to be lying so goddamn_ close? _  
_

 _He could have_ sworn _there was more space between them only a second ago._

_Her long hair tickles the bare flesh of his bicep; having stripped himself of his shirt and jeans upon retiring to bed to sleep in his boxers._

_She adjusts her position ever so slightly, and he raises an eyebrow as the soft cotton of her shorts brushes low against his abdomen._

_He wonders whether he should be embarrassed by the fact that his body responds to this sensation as unabashedly as it does, but then_ he's _not the one rubbing his tight, little ass against his ex-boss's crotch._

_"What are you doing?"_

_Lower this time- muttering into the shell of her ear- but he knows._

_Oh, doesn't he just know what she's doing..._

_Slipping his hand around her to rest flat against her stomach, he pulls her into him with a little more force; guiding her body into applying pressure where he needs it most._

_Growling into golden tresses, he allows his fingers to wander a little further south; slipping his hand beneath the waistband of her shorts to find the scant cotton of her underwear._

_Slim legs clench together, but she backs up into him teasingly, and he slips a long middle finger deftly over damp cotton and smirks as she lets out a low hiss, and her hair smells like coconut, and her heat smells like freshly ground... Coffee?_

Coffee?

Blinking slowly to adjust to the dim shadows that shroud his ex-employee's living room, House suppresses a groan as the beer from the night before greets him with an overly friendly thrumming behind his eyeballs.

He is a veteran of a heavy night's drinking, but he has found that since stumbling past forty, he is no longer spared the aftermath of his decisions.

The dull ache in his groin isn't doing much to help matters either.

_Fuck..._

'Fuck', indeed. It has been a long time since he has dreamt about his young protégée in a less than platonic fashion- certainly not since she flew the nest- but the hyper reality of his most recent curse of the sandman is something entirely different from the old dreams in which he had frequented bars or hired an escort only to find himself confronted with some ill-remembered, subconscious-fractured, dream-version of the young doctor.

Slinging his arm over his eyes and clenching his jaw as he attempts to coral the static hiss of his hangover into submission, he finally proceeds to rub at his eyes before taking better stock of his surroundings.

Flat white ceiling; no nicotine stains, of course.

An understated lampshade he has seen replicated a thousand times before.

A thin, hairline crack in the paint in the far left corner.

Rolling over onto his side to observe her small kitchenette, he frowns.

"... Why are you sitting in the dark?"

His voice sounds obscenely loud to his own ears as he addresses the blonde's shadow-casted profile, and she turns to regard him with a start.

"Huh?"

A silver spoon heaped with muesli comes to a stop halfway up to her mouth as she sits perched up on one of the barstools that surround her kitchen island.

Before her sits a steaming mug of coffee.

_Coffee._

And her hair _is_ wet- the scent of her shampoo detectable from where he lies- but her tshirt is navy blue, not white, and he slowly come to the realisation that he had imagined her in the same tshirt she'd worn during the _last_ time his brain selected to conjure her after being shot.

_Curious._

Perhaps, but he's not about to get Freudian over the fact.

His current interest is directed much more towards her behaviour than her wardrobe.

"Why are you eating your breakfast in the dark?"

"I didn't want to wake you."

A fair answer, yes, but there is still something ever so slightly comical to the situation, and he rolls his eyes as he finds he isn't surprised in the slightest.

"I made you coffee, but it's still in the machine to stay warm."

No. Not surprised at all.

_Of course you did._

Nor is he surprised when she lowers herself carefully from her seat and pads over to pour it for him.

"Thank you."

She nods at his low murmur, making her way over with a large, yellow mug and proffering it to him with a small, slightly awkward smile.

"If you, uh, if you can get ready soon then I can give you a lift..."

"To work?"

A sudden edge to the older doctor's voice, but Cameron bears this no mind.

She isn't any more surprised at House's behaviour than he is by hers.

"No, to yours so you can take your bike... I need to leave in twenty minutes."

She informs him, before padding back to the bar to finish her breakfast.

He tells himself to look away.

_You've grown up, Cameron..._


	12. Chapter 12

Regarding his team lazily as he rocks back in his chair, House frowns as he is accosted yet again by that most unnerving smell.

Almonds.

_Cameron._

He had used the soap beside her sink to scrub at his face in an attempt to eradicate any lingering traces of sleep, but now pays the price of catching that soft, sweet scent that sends his memory reeling as he recalls detecting that same aroma ghosting from countless patient files annotated in her neat, black cursive. His reaction to this assault on his senses frustrates him, as he attempts to deny the strange feeling of comfortable familiarity; telling himself that it is more his dislike for change than anything to do with the young blonde herself that has him pondering such a thing in a positive light.

Glancing over at Thirteen, he takes stock of pretty, heightened features with a peculiar clinical efficiency.

_She's_ _undeniably_ _much sexier than Cameron._

Perhaps this is true, but the thought doesn't offer him as much smug comfort as he'd like.

_She smiles less._

Also true. The sometimes severe brunette lacks that same ever-hopeful look that had irked him so during the years spent with Cameron working beneath him, and he imagines the stark difference in the features and expressions of the two women might say more than he'd like it to about where his head had been at when making _that_ particular choice, despite their physicalites being much the same.

Hadley hasn't set herself up to continually endure the painful lesson that the world sucks, which blonde seems _incapable_ of learning once and for all.

She knows it can and that it often does.

She is easier to deal with.

When he spits spite to hurt her, she gets annoyed.

It isn't always such a goddamned fucking _surprise_.

"House!"

His irritable pondering is fractured by the sharp tongue of the Dean as her bark cuts through the air like a whip.

Cuddy stands with her head poked round the door to regard the diagnostics team with a flustered expression.

Second-guessing the reasoning behind the Dean's tone, the graying doctor looks to his team with wide eyes of burlesque surprise, as though only just noticing them.

"What are you lot doing sat around here?! You mean to tell me that not _one_ of you had the sense to take my shift down in the Clinic? You-"

"-Never mind your incompetence to follow your job requirements right now; there's been a case file waiting for any _one_ of you idiots to bother checking downstairs, and a patient who's been waiting in the ICU for over half an hour. Contrary to your beliefs, I'm not paying you- _any_ of you- to sit around on your asses twiddling your thumbs, learning from the King of this discipline. Up! Go! Out! Now!"

The younger doctors that lounge around the large desk that centers the DDX room come round from their apathetic state with a start, the room suddenly filled with the dull scrape of metal chair legs on worn carpet as they hurry from the room in the wake of the small brunette who stalks irritably back towards her office; shaking her head as she goes.

* * *

"Are you alright?"

Cameron inquires, raising an eyebrow in question as Foreman falls into the seat opposite her and scoots over to the edge of the booth. Taking his responsive grunt to be a negative, she pushes her tray aside after rescuing the steaming cup of coffee that remains untouched and takes a sip, regarding the neurologist thoughtfully.

"Patient trouble or House trouble?"

"Both... Patient's a mess-"

"-Uncooperative?"

"Unresponsive! Which of course means House is out to solve some great and wondrous mystery in his ever cryptic manner... Full of useless suggestions, and... Well... You know what he's like... And it's not the most _enjoyable_ case as it is."

"Oh?"

"Twenty-three year old Hispanic female brought in suffering convulsions and internal bleeding."

"Liver failure?"

"We tested for it, but there was little point. The bleeding has nothing to do with the seizures; the girl's black and blue all over... Broken ribs, cracked sternum... You name it, it's either broken or has been at some point. The Clinic say she was dropped off outside and left for someone to come see to her. She's been conscious a few times, but never coherent enough for questioning... Which of course suits _House_ just fine-"

"-She can't lie-"

"-Right... But it makes things difficult. She had a bag on her with some ID, but we can't find any existing medical records under her name. We have no way of knowing whether she's allergic to anything, or been prescribed anything in the past... We're doing the tests, but they're time consuming, and she's deteriorating fairly quickly... I don't know, I just look at her and I hurt... Hate to imagine what it'd be like if _you_ were working the case..."

Despite his sour mood, Forman offers a small smirk as he serves up this last part, and the blonde rolls her eyes mainly to humour him; sipping at her coffee pensively.

"That's hard though... You call the police?"

"Cameron..."

"Yeah, yeah, I know... She needs to consent... But-"

"-Yeah, 'but' is the part that's the real issue here. I don't know. She's just young, and that's a hell of a lot of hurting on one small girl."

"...Sounds it."

Cameron sighs, surprised that her ex-colleague expresses his empathy so vocally, and clenching her jaw as she imagines just how bad that means the diagnostics team's case must be.

"Well... If you need any help with tests or anything-"

"-Then the other three can do it... You left, remember?"

"I do... But I just thought... I mean, if you don't want my help then-"

"-You barely have time to get things done as it is..."

The neurologist interjects with tired patience; the blonde's sudden hurt at thinking him undesiring of her company painfully evident on her face."

"...And anyway, aren't you supposed to be taking it easy? How's your hip?"

"I'm fine."

"Is it healing alright?"

"It's fine!... Shit, it's like everyone's a damn doctor all of a sudden!"

Foreman rolls his eyes at her crappy joke, but doesn't press the subject any further. He had heard from Chase about the state in which the young surgeon had found Cameron back in her apartment, and the two of them had shared the communal opinion of their female ex-counterpart's actions being rather worrisome indeed. Of course, Chase had griped the cause to be House, and the neurologist doesn't deem this theory to be all that ludicrous, but, he'd hope they were wrong.

For all their arguments and bickering, he cares for the blonde as though she were his sister- having been forced to spend often fourteen hours a day under extreme pressure in her company- and he is relieved that she seems alright after the fearful discussion shared with Chase; the surgeon alarmingly pale upon his return from delivering Cameron to the ER.

"Good."

She smiles.

"I don't 'do' taking it easy."

"Yes, _that_ much I suppose I know... And look... It wasn't that I don't want you around or anything with what I said before, I just know you're busy... And I _also_ know you have the absolute _worst_ case of Florence Nightingale syndrome."

"You know, I was reading somewhere that she was actually rather unappealing in person."

"...As I was saying..."

Pretty pink lips fall open in mock offence, and Foreman shakes his head wearily.

"You just have a tendency to try and spread yourself too thin... And anyway, you're currently in the decidedly _enviable_ position of not having to deal with House."

"... I guess... Well, anyway, like you said, you have a perfectly good team."

"They're alright."

"Yeah? Meshing well?"

"... Yes?

The neurologist frowns as he catches the ill-hidden teasing lilt to the blonde's inquiry.

"Good."

"Ok...?"

"That's very good."

"It is...I- What? Why are you smiling like that?"

"Oh, I just imagine you're meshing with some better than others."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'm sure Hadley's good to work with... Pretty too..."

"Thirteen?!... Yeah... I mean, she's a good doctor..."

"Mmmhmm."

"Oh, stop it."

Foreman grumbles, scowling at the young immunologist as she smirks smugly.

"What? Am I wrong?"

"... I take it back; I don't want you around."

"Aw, come on!"

"No, seriously, I forgot what a pain you truly are."

"Rude."

"It's your own fault... To be fair, I'm not sure quite how well the rest of the team would take to you pitching in..."

"Thirteen wouldn't like it?"

"Oh, for god's sake! Will you just quit it?!... And, you know, of all of them, Thirteen might well be the _most_ likely to be on board."

"Oh?"

Cameron raises an eyebrow to match Foreman's own as he looks her up and down pointedly.

"And I'm sure House wouldn't mind either..."

_He couldn't be more wrong._


	13. Chapter 13

Bursting into the oncology office without warning, House throws himself down onto the low sofa that backs up against the windowsill and lets his cane clatter to the floor dramatically; thunder evident at his brow.

"I'm sorry, do you have an appointment?"

Wilson inquires, without looking up from his notes.

"Convulsions, respiratory problems and a septic rash..."

"You realise your office is the next one along, right?"

"Oh, and a swelling of the tongue, let's not forget our _newest_ symptom."

"...Wherein you have an entire team trained for just this situation..."

"Foreman and Thirteen are in the labs, Taub's running trace, Kutner's in the clinic... And not _one_ of them have offered up a useful suggestion for the past twenty-four hours. Best advice I've received so far came from the fucking _wombat_ of all people down in the locker room- 'get a drink and go home'- and the day I start following _Chase's_ suggestions is the day I...I... Fuck it... Make your own analogy. It's not happening."

Lowering his pen with a sigh, Wilson leans back in his chair and regards his old friend soberly.

"Septic rash and swelling indicate an allergic reaction."

"Well, if it isn't Boy Wonder, saving the world one _obvious_ observation at a time."

"It's not my specialty."

"Just imagine she's losing her hair and sporting a lump here or there."

"You know who you _should_ be asking..."

"Yes, the patient, but she's not in a position to talk right now... Which _ordinarily_ is the state in which I like them best, but-"

"-You want a second opinion on an allergic reaction, go and find Cameron."

"Why, so that she _too_ can tell me what I already know?"

"... It's her specialty."

"She won't know anything I don't..."

"... Which is why you're asking an oncologist about swelling of the tongue..."

"Could be mouth cancer."

"... I'm not even going to justify that with a biopsy."

Wilson retorts, shaking his head and returning to his paperwork.

"Go and ask Cameron, House. You could barely stay away from her just the other day, let alone shut up about her."

"...Oh god, not this again..."

House groans irritably, a small flicker of anger igniting within him yet again at the troublesome blonde, but he dismisses it in favor of glaring at Wilson, picking up his cane, and dragging it across his friend's desk as he leaves, sending papers cascading onto the floor.

* * *

Limping away from a rather distraught looking Thirteen, House yells over his shoulder for the young brunette to get changed and switch shifts with Kutner; Hadley's pristine doctor's whites splattered with blood sent spraying up at her from a ruptured cyst. Yet another curiosity to be added to their patient's growing list of symptoms.

Cane thudding dully on ammonia-smelling linoleum, the graying doctor heads in the direction of the ER without really thinking about it.

The windows that line the corridor allow deep indigo to bleed though slanted blinds; the hour late and the hustle and bustle of the hospital at a thankful minimum. Even the ER- when he stalks through the large double doors- is fairly quiet at this time of night. Glancing over at a young nurse in the corner, he recognises her as Nancy What's-Her-Name and moves over to inquire the whereabouts of the blonde; not spotting her amongst the sickeningly pink scrubs.

"Allison? I think she's in the break room."

Nodding and offering a grunt of thanks, House heads off towards the back of the room; pondering the fact that no matter how long he's known her, he will never think of the young doctor by her first name.

Entering the break room, House experiences a moment's discomfort as this is a realm he rarely frequents. It is odd to him finding the blonde hanging around in this strange room, making coffee and chatting to staff he has never met.

_And chatting fairly animatedly at that._

Standing unnoticed in the door, he runs his long fingers over the handle of his cane pensively as he watches the interactions between the young doctor and a male nurse who sits perched on a low coffee table in the corner. Cameron has removed her scrubs- presumably off the ward for the time being but staying about to work a split shift- and stands leant over the back of the sofa; her elbows crossed beneath her breasts to support her as she laughs at something her colleague says, rocking her hips slightly from side to side.

She wears plain grey slacks which hug the globed flesh of her ass pleasingly in her current position, and a black woollen sweater he recognises due to a curious zip detail at the nape. Recognises... And knows the front of which to be cut in a surprisingly low V for the blonde's tastes; explaining the peculiar restless flickering of the nurse's eyes as he looks up at her.

She makes some inane comment regarding nylon stockings which has her colleague barking with laughter; wolfish grin suggesting a salacious inside meaning to her words, and House doesn't need to be able to see her face to know that the pink tip of her tongue will be poking teasingly between her teeth as intelligent eyes glitter beneath well-arched brows.

"As great a view as it offers, you really shouldn't be standing that way so soon after surgery-"

Golden tresses tumble as the young doctor spins round at the sound of House's voice; a low hiss at the sudden movement supporting his warning as to taking it easy on her hip.

"- But then, weren't we recently discussing that you might have tastes of a kinkier nature? If bondage isn't an issue, maybe a little helping of pain as you stand so prettily bent over is just the ticket? Tell me, does it make you scream when-"

"-What do you want, House?"

She inquires caustically, though he is pleased to note a light blush colouring her cheeks as she crosses her arms over her chest and attempts to pull off an icy glare. He is less enamoured with the raised eyebrow and assumptive grin the male nurse offers her; dull brown eyes roaming over the blonde without shame. Catching House watching him, he offers a knowing smirk which has the graying doctor restraining the sudden urge walk over to the table and cave the man's head in with his cane.

"What will twenty dollars get me?"

He expects a disdainful cry of outrage, but instead she regards him levelly; green eyes cool and thoroughly unimpressed.

"It'll certainly get you a repeat of last night..."

Imagining his eyebrows are raised just as high as those of the spluttering man in the corner, he coaches his features swiftly to form a smirk, cocking his head to regard her curiously.

"Oh?"

"Sure; you can sleep on the sofa on your own..."

"Oh, dude, that's cold."

Both doctors turn to face the grinning nurse with equally disgruntled expressions; House eyeing him with open revulsion, while Cameron assumes a bizarrely authoritative pose and gestures towards the door with a nod of her jaw.

"Don't you have rounds to make, Tristan?"

"Not for another ten min-"

"-I think you should maybe start them a little early."

She suggests with bizarre sweetness, and the young man offers House one final glance before nodding and pushing himself up from the table.

"Good idea... Catch you later, Ali-.. Dr Cameron."

Watching her colleague hurry from the room, the blonde turns to her old boss and assumes a frown.

"What's with the look?"

She inquires; House's crystal blues twinkling as he regards her with an odd little smile.

"You're _bossy_ in the ER!"

He offers gleefully; taking in the young immunologist's foreign 'I'm not in the mood to take any shit' stance appreciatively.

"Yeah... Well... He's beneath me, and-"

"- Ah, that explains why that got so awkward-"

"- _professionally_ beneath me, and that was an entirely inappropriate comment."

"I see... Kind of like you insinuating you share a bed with me most nights..."

"Or like _you_ insinuating that I'm a sexual masochist!"

"Are you?"

"...That's going to cost you a lot more than twenty dollars to find out."

Despite her deepening blush, she grins cattily, sensing victory as House is momentarily unable to mask a surprised bark of laughter; his eyes on her wide and openly impressed.

"Do you take Amex?"

"What do you want, House?"

"Do you know 'around the world'?"

"... House!"

"Septic rash and swollen tongue."

"... God, I hope those aren't more requests..."

"Convulsions with a diminishing interim period and respiratory difficulty."

"Conscious?"

"Sporadically."

"You get her allergy tests back?"

"Some. None of them conclusive."

"... Okay... Give me a minute, I'll meet you in the labs."

"Fine."

Watching the blonde move over to the sink to wash up her mug, House frowns, addressing her with a careful lack of emotion.

"And, Cameron... Don't-"

"-Tell Wilson you asked me? Wouldn't dream of it."


	14. Chapter 14

By the time the blonde joins him in the lab, House has already set up a small selection of vials and works slowly to unwrap a couple of slides. Negating to acknowledge her as Cameron pulls over one of the high, white stools that flank the counter, he simply places the freshly unpackaged slides neatly in front of her and waits as she pulls on a pair of gloves.

"You know, if people weren't dying, I'd call you an idiot of accepting work out of hours."

"You call me an idiot plenty, anyway."

She responds noncommittally as she prepares a swab from the first of the vials containing a dark sample of blood.

"True, but you should find solace in the fact that I still hold you in higher regard than the wombat."

"I'm touched."

"Of course, _Chase_ hasn't attempted to rearrange his organs in a _bathtub_..."

"That you know of..."

"Ah! A fair point by a fair maiden! I mean, perhaps he's _into_ that... _You_ would know."

"Would I?"

"Oh, don't be coy... Come on, what makes our fine, young surgeon tick?"

"Well, he very much likes it when _you_ leave him alone. Other than that, I really can't say."

"Always a lady."

"Medically, it keeps things from getting too complicated."

She snips back, slotting the slide carefully into place under the microscope and leaning forwards to analyse its contents. House watches casually as she fiddles with the focus while bouncing her knee in a way he remembers well.

"... Though, I suppose if I have to imagine _anyone_ lying around in their underwear, I'd pick you over Foreman or the Hobbit..."

"What about Thirteen?"

"Oh, she's there too; tending to your needs. I'd imagine-"

"-House, I'm sure you have a whole, feature-length scenario figured out, but could you maybe keep it to yourself?"

"Oh, Cameron, no one's saying you're _gay_... They're just lamenting the alternative-"

"-Did you want my help, or just a discussion on my sexuality?"

"Well... If you're offering-"

"-Where are the notes your team took? I don't want to tell you what you already know... White cell count is low, which I'm sure you guys picked up on, the sample has elevated viscosity..."

She murmurs as he limps over to the far side of the counter and picks up a slim, green file. Holding her hand out for it without looking up from the lens, she takes it from him, and eventually sits back to rifle through the papers within.

"Foreman says she's been abused?"

She broaches; glancing up at the greying doctor over the frame of her glasses.

"Why do you think I asked you to help in the _lab_ , rather than check out the patient? I'm already having to spend _time_ with you, I don't need your heart bleeding all over the floor."

"... I've dealt with abused patients before just fine, House."

"I know, but it's the whole drama and overdose of _empathy_ I was trying to avoid."

"You know, whoever taught you how to show gratitude towards those attempting to help you _really_ missed the mark..."

"So _help_. What have you got for me?"

Sighing as House shows no sign of acknowledging her irritation, the blonde looks back down at the notes in her hand and taps her fingers pensively on the pristine surface of the counter.

"Nothing the others haven't written here already. I agree with- Kutner? Is the black print his?- it looks like there's a reaction taking place, and I don't think it's organic... I think you need to take a step back and look into each symptom individually- which I'm sure you're doing, I'm just saying- as the anomalies in the sample here could be due to a toxin, but there might also just be an abnormality due to her body trying to ward off infection... Not all of her injuries are current?"

"No, there's a couple of scans in the back there of the fractures which also show previous breaks and regrowth. Open lacerations and wounds that have started to heal and scar go back at least a week, but older scar tissue points to her suffering whatever conditions she's been in for several months at least."

"Shit... Did you guys ask security to check if they got the plates of the car that brought her here?"

"Why? You fancy yourself a little game of Nancy Drew?"

"No. But your team might... Chances are it's not registered to wherever they've been keeping her, but if you're stuck for any other leads, it can't hurt to look."

"Ah, Dr Cameron; 'chances are the felons have a stolen vehicle'. Spoken like a true, naive, little white girl."

"... You realise that I'm twenty-seven, have been published in several journals, and have so far managed to cross the the street without getting mown down by on-coming traffic, right?"

"Get out! Next you'll be telling me you don't sleep with a night-light!"

"It's true; once I quit working for you, the nightmares stopped."

House chuckles darkly at this, before taking back the patient file and browsing through the litter of notes dotting the pages. Sighing, he watches as the blonde slips from her chair and pulls off the thin, latex gloves and throws them neatly in the trash.

"You're not going to check out any of the others?"

"No point. You have all the information I could give you written out in front of you in pretty, blue cursive. Thirteen's?"

"Jealous?"

"Of Hadley's handwriting? I don't think I'll lose any sleep."

"Not what I meant."

"I know, I'm just tired of you asking me that. Yes, House, we both have breasts and lady-parts and have worked beneath you; it doesn't mean I compare myself to her any more than any of the others. She's welcome to you; I quit, remember? And incidentally; _you're_ the one that keeps seeking _me_ out."

"Well, I could have just left you to bleed in the middle of the ER..."

"You _could_ have stayed home rather than limp all the way to my apartment late at night..."

She bites back irritably; used to House's less redeeming characteristics, but finding herself altogether a little exhausted trying to keep up with them just recently. It has been almost six months since his new team started working properly beneath him- and not just simply keeping him occupied by vying for their positions- and she had hoped the constant remarks about her thoughts towards Hadley would have petered out by now.

She has been enjoying their camaraderie.

She doesn't want to keep being reminded of the fact he'd turned her down.

_Or the pitiful fact that it did nothing to stop that pathetic sense of wanting, and we both know it..._

The thunder that crosses the greying doctor's face lets her know she's hit a nerve, and she sighs.

"Look... Your team's done the tests already... I can't tell you anything more by looking at blood and fluids. I could _maybe_ tell you more if I studied the patient, but you're right; I did quit... I don't _mind_ helping you, House, but I'm not _obligated_ to do it... If you want my help and you want to be friendly with me then I'm _more_ than happy to indulge both those things, but I'm not your little girl anymore, and I'm not going to let myself get all worried and confused about the fact that one minute you're nice to me and then next you make a point of trying to bring me down. Colleagues, I can do... But you're not my boss, anymore."

"Hmm... The kitten grew claws..."

House growls moodily. He is unsure exactly where their playful bickering had taken this nastier turn, but he is sure that _she's_ the one to blame. He can't see how a proposition for help has ended up in the blonde scolding him as though he were a child, and the fact that she regards him cooly and with none of her usual nervous energy when in his presence frustrates him.

The casual way in which she had flirted with the nurse back in the ER had frustrated him.

Her unwelcome starring role in his dream had frustrated him.

He has grown used to seeing her around the hospital- just as he is used to purposefully rapping Chase's shins with his cane whenever stumbling upon the surgeon- but this is all starting to feel a little too familiar.

Familiar, but for one, disconcerting element:

 _She's_ not the one losing sleep.

Glaring at her- trying to find within himself a distaste for long, pale tresses and slightly darker makeup- he shrugs and picks up his cane.

"Fine, I shouldn't have bothered. I'll let you get back to work, Dr Cameron."

"Hang on, what? You shouldn't have _bothered_? It's not _my_ fault there's nothing else hiding away in those vials, House. I was trying to _help_ you!"

"Then it turns out I was right; you _are_ an idiot."


	15. Chapter 15

_"Then it turns out I was right; you_ are _an idiot."_

House growls, before turning heel and limping from the room, leaving the blonde chewing on her tongue irritably. Taking a moment to corral her thoughts, Cameron sniffs dismissively, before stalking back to the samples that line the counter and placing them back in the tray that houses the diagnostics team's ongoing cases; making a neat note on the accompanying clipboard of the date, time, and vial she had opened to obtain a sample.

She hesitates as she goes to initial her fine, rolling cursive; annotating the paper first with a small 'A.C.' before carefully blocking out the 'A' and turning the 'C' into a 'G' and signing off under House's name instead. She guesses it makes little difference- her writing and House's nothing alike- but she suddenly wants absolutely nothing to do with the case in question.

In fact; she suddenly wants nothing to do with the hospital in _general_ , and she reminds herself that this is precisely _why_ she'd handed in her resignation.

She is curious- no, _more_ than curious, after all, being part of that old team, in that old room, had been almost like a drug to each of them- as to the suffering young woman's mystery ailment, but she is through letting House talk to her like shit.

_Sure... That's why you really gave him a good talking to just now for being such an asshole, rather than simply watching him get bored of you and leave..._

_Oh hush._

She smiles.

She has to, or her ingrained ways would surely drive her mad.

She tries not to think about their amiable laughter while bathed in the unforgiving light in McDonalds.

Nor about the way he'd held her to him when walking her carefully- _so_ carefully- over to the exam room to see to her injury.

...It just gets too confusing when she does.

"What's a girl like you doing in a place like this?"

Jumping in surprise as she hadn't heard the quiet hiss of the glass door to the lab being pushed open, she looks over her shoulder to regard Chase with a smirk.

"Oh, you know, just trying to breed a super-virus."

"And people always thought you were the _nice_ one..."

"Fools..."

She chuckles quietly, but her companion's own laughter is due to the fact the blonde's cheeks flush slightly at her own ill-meaning insinuation.

"Try again, Flo."

" _Four_ years, and you and Foreman _still_ get off on that, huh?"

"Aw, don't get all butt-hurt; you were Florence, and we were your machine!"

Cameron rolls her eyes as she moves aside to let Chase access the far counter.

"Different Florence... Nightingale _did-_ according to some accounts- have an owl, though. She kept it in her pocket."

"And you know this _how_?"

The blond inquires as he shoots her an amused glance over his shoulder.

"I was reading a paper on the Crimean War the other night-"

"-You don't get out much, do you?"

"... Four years, and still that slight tone of _surprise_..."

She sighs, but Chase pays this little mind; making his way over to the tray in which she'd recently placed back House's fluid samples, and frowning at the accompanying documentation.

"You signed off for House?"

"Oh... Yeah, I, uh, said I'd take a quick look at something for him."

"The Latina girl?"

"Yeah... Why? Did he ask you to take a look too?"

"Are you _mad_? Course he didn't. Foreman did."

"...Not really your specialty..."

Her words are low, but he catches them easily, and turns round to regard the blonde properly. He knows her well enough to doubt that the curious hint of irritation and spite- _spite? really?_ \- that laces her words will have been directed towards him, nor does he take any offence to her blatant acceptance that House would be unlikely to seek him out for advice. What he _does_ find strange however, is Cameron's rather cagey demeanour in regards to his asking about the case, and he leans back against the counter and raises an eyebrow.

"Something up?"

"Not that I know of."

"Cameron..."

Sighing, she shrugs; perching lightly on one of the stools.

"...Nothing new, just House being House."

"Isn't that why you quit? What did he do?"

"Asked for help... Then called me an idiot for trying to help."

"Well... That _does_ sound like House."

"Yeah... I know I shouldn't care..."

"But you do."

She shrugs, and he mimics the action; leaving what they both know to be her reasoning- if that's what she could call it- unsaid. It is a dulled, fleeting affliction, but they no more mention its lingering shadow these days, than they do the events that led her to possess the large, men's hoody in which he'd dressed her back at her apartment.

 _We argue less this way... And it prevents the subsequent speculation over the fact that no such lingering feelings- at least of naive hope- still exist between the two of_ us _..._

Still... All awkwardness aside, he has a lot of time for the blonde, and doesn't like to see her tensed and bemused the way she stands before him now. Offering her a smile, he plucks his pager from his pocket and gives it a cursory glance, before looking back down at the papers pertaining to House's patient.

"Well, given as I have a feeling Foreman only asked _me_ to take a look at these because he didn't find you _first,_ I'm not sure what more I'd have to offer if young Flo herself isn't glasses deep in notes and pipettes... I get off in twenty minutes. I'd tell you I wanted to buy you dinner, but I actually just have one more stamp left on my loyalty card for that Italian place down on Weydon, so it's more just a case of giving in to sucker advertising."

"Sounds good."

"You'll lower and debase yourself with me?"

"I'm fairly sure half those stamps are partly mine anyway; you practically _owe_ me for helping you finish your plate on a regular basis."

"True... Now, if only you'd wait for me to _ask_ for such noble aid."

She shrugs with a smirk.

"You should just learn not to order olive bread."

"Or just quit asking you to join me..."

"Perhaps, but for tonight, it's too late. I have no food in the house, and I've already accepted your offer to be wined and dined. I have to wait for a couple of test results to come through, and then I'm properly off the clock. Meet you there? Doctor style?"

Chase grins at the term the three of them had appropriated early on into their fellowship for the rather unpredictable meet-up timings plaguing their profession.

"Doctor style."

* * *

Limping into the DDX room, House clocks his employees with hard, blue ice; studying each of them in turn.

His gaze falls upon the pretty brunette last and longest.

He frowns irritably, before turning towards the whiteboard and rapping it with his cane.

"So, it has been brought to my attention that- _apparently_ \- everything you lot are doing is entirely _adequate_ ; so _much_ so, that a second opinion had seemed- by _one_ account at least- as good as pointless..."

Silence.

"So _why_ then, children, is there nothing new written on this goddamn _board_?!"


	16. Chapter 16

"Seriously?"

"Dead serious."

"You told her you were a doctor and she said she didn't want any of your details, even though you scratched the paint?"

"Well, I told her I was in a hurry to get into the surgery and see to a young patient..."

"I'll bet you did..."

"May have flipped my hair a bit too..."

" _Un_ believable."

Cameron laughs as she rolls her eyes; regarding Chase over the rim of a large glass of wine.

"Oh, come on, how is that any worse than the time you scored a free meal in Darnelli's?!"

"I didn't _'score a free meal',_ I stopped an eighty year old woman from _choking!_ "

"Mhhmm, and did this or did it not lead to the manager offering to wave the check?"

"You're complaining _awful_ hard for a guy that got a free steak..."

"I'm not _complaining_ , I'm making a point! You used your doctor status to get free stuff; you're just as corrupt as the rest of us!"

"Well, I _could_ have just left her to suffocate, but the thought kind of put me off my food..."

"Yeah, well, the thought of paying out a shitload on insurance for a car that often seems reluctant to start put _me_ off, too!"

Shaking her head dramatically, the blonde spears a long stem of broccoli onto her fork and nibbles at it with a grin as Chase saws his way through a rather bloody rump steak.

"To be honest, I think it's time to admit defeat and get rid of that piece of scrap anyway."

He laments through a mouthful of meat; the car in question having belonged to his dorm-mate back in pre-med, and passed down to him once its original owner relocated back to Germany; the car loved and abused accordingly.

"You can't get rid of the _Beemer!_ "

Cameron cries, shaking her head in a way that sends soft curls tumbling dangerously close towards dipping into her wine.

"Too many good memories in the back seat?"

The young surgeon quips with a smirk, before holding up his hands in mock surrender at the death-glare such bold wit garners him. Chuckling as the blonde takes a sip from her wine without lowering her cold glower, he goes back to his meal without a care; not missing the pull to the corners of her mouth, and knowing her well enough to understand that when not in the work place, she will allow such snide comments with good humor unless expressly fashioned to hurt her.

Which she knows he wouldn't purposefully do.

Leave that to House.

Not that he imagines Cameron and House will ever spend much time on neutral territory.

"Speaking of cars, did you hear they're thinking of charging staff an annual-"

But she breaks off as Chase's attention suddenly flickers from her to the back of the restaurant, and he adopts a welcoming smile and beckons with his hand. Twisting round in her seat, she mimics such actions upon spotting Foreman shaking out his coat in the doorway before handing it to the maître d.

She tells herself she in no way feels her face fall when a pretty brunette slips in behind the neurologist and murmurs something to him while shedding her own jacket.

_After all, from what little conversation we've had, she seems perfectly nice..._

Perfectly nice, yes.

But then her issue has little to do with Thirteen herself.

Reapplying her smile as Foreman and Hadley make their way over- a waiter nodding pleasantly and placing a set of menus out on the adjacent table- she parrots Chase's greetings and laughs when Foreman pulls at the table and shuffles his chair so that he sits directly beside her.

"Well, look who came _crawling_ in!"

Chase offers with a smirk, before adopting a slightly more subdued tone of voice as he takes in the others' morose expressions.

"Uh oh, what's happened?"

"Lost the patient..."

Thirteen sighs, running a contemplative finger over the menu in a curious pattern, but paying its content no mind.

"Shit..."

The surgeon offers, and Cameron pulls a similar face as they sit in silence for a moment; each of them understanding the dull sense of loss that accompanies this ultimate hazard of the profession. She offers Hadley a kind smile as the latter sighs and looks back up; imagining the brunette's death-toll must still be relatively low and raw.

"Shit is right-"

Foreman sighs as he plucks up his menu and signals at the waiter to bring over a couple of beers; switching two fingers to four upon noting his ex-colleagues' fast dwindling bottle of wine.

"-It was quick in the end, and it was messy... And House was, well, _House_ about it... Last time I saw him acting _this_ badly though was during that whole incident with Vogler-"

He shrugs awkwardly at the brief surge of tension the name sparks between the two older doctors to his side

"- I mean, he came _storming_ upstairs demanding answers, questioned the work done so far, kept saying he had it on 'good authority' that we seemed to know what we were doing, and that we best come through and _prove_ it... Said there was 'no point' looking over the samples taken as they had been deemed useless, and told Hadley... Well..."

He trails off, sighing, as the brunette lowers her chin into her hand and purses her lips irritably, before she elaborates.

"He wanted to know why I didn't have all the answers... Like it was _my_ fault we've found nothing..."

"Well... It's House... House likes to have a scapegoat handy..."

Chase offers gently, and Thirteen shakes her head and throws her hands up in defeat.

"I checked over everything we had! I _checked_ it all! I can't just-"

"-Of _course_ you did... It's not _you_... He just... The puzzle wasn't solved, and he hoped that you would solve it. Sometimes time runs out... Just, for House, it maybe doesn't happen as often as it might for others in his profession..."

Cameron interjects; regretting her words the second they leave her lips. The long-suffering sigh both men offer up let her know her she's coming across as taking the wrong side- _House's_ side- while the look Hadley offers her simply serves to make her feel a little uncomfortable. Shrugging, she finishes the last of the wine and allows the others to take over the conversation; responding to Foreman's challenging glances towards her as he chats with the pretty brunette before him with smirks that seem decidedly half-hearted.

* * *

Sitting at his desk with his head in his hands, House stares down at their late patient's files without really seeing them.

They won't do him any good now, anyway.

It had all come down to some sort of reaction.

What kind, they're still none the wiser...

But it had been a _reaction_.

An allergic reaction?

Maybe.

 _Some_ sort of reaction though.

That much is certain.

Black and white.

"And if she'd taken the time to _look_ at the damn samples _properly_ , she might have seen it..."


	17. Chapter 17

Waving amiably at Foreman and Thirteen as they slip from the restaurant, Chase lowers his hand and motions towards the empty tables that play their setting with his jaw.

"Guess we should let these lovely people go home..."

Cameron frowns slightly- reminded of House saying much the same thing back in McDonalds- and nods indifferently; plucking a couple of notes from her pocket to cover what the Surgeon's coupon does not. Smiling his thanks, the blond cocks his head pensively as he regards the young woman checking her phone and tugging on her jacket.

"Why the sudden descent into apathy?"

"Huh?"

"You've been almost silent for the last half an hour... Are you-"

"-I'm fine... Just sucks about the patient, I guess..."

"Which patien- _House's_ patient?! Cam, at least save your depression for your own unit! You-"

"- We could have looked over her bloodwork again..."

"... Allison. Stop. It wan't our case. You quit, remember?"

"But I-"

"-You didn't find anything in her bloodwork, and yes, ok, you didn't spend long looking... But neither did any of the _others_ , and they've spent the best part of the _week_ dealing with this case. House's new team may not have much experience yet, but Foreman _does_. Perhaps the reason nobody found anything of use is because there was nothing to _find._ "

He shrugs and pushes himself from the table, waiting for the blonde to do the same and lead the way out; nodding to the waiters as they pass.

Once outside and rudely affronted by the cold wind that bites at any exposed flesh mercilessly, they stroll down the street until they reach an intersection and go their separate ways after a brief exchange of pleasantries. Stalking quickly through the hazy pools of light cast by the iron hooks of blackened lampposts towering up above, Cameron comes to a halt as she nears her apartment. She's tired, and can think of no better way to end the evening than with a scaldingly hot shower and finishing off the chapter she currently reads in the comfort of her bed, but she knows full well that she'll neither be able to sleep nor concentrate.

Sighing, she detours left and trudges on through the polluted darkness- fractured occasionally by the lights and commotion emanating from the odd bar or gathering- until the dull brick of the hospital looms up ahead.

* * *

The blonde shucks her coat but keeps it draped over the crook of her arm as she leans against the cool, metal wall of the elevator. Stalking the harshly lit halls at this hour is nothing new to her, but she feels slightly out of place with the soft tang of wine lingering on her tongue and her slacks having been vetoed for jeans. Still, she has her ID in her bag should she need it, and to any passers by, she quite clearly knows where she's going.

 _Why_ she's going there, she has less of a clue...

She just knows she won't be able to sleep until she goes over the results in the lab one more time.

* * *

House frowns as he limps up the silent hallway that leads to the labs for his wing of the Hospital. He had told himself that he would make the short journey home after looking through the notes accompanying his late patient's fluids one more time; food for thought to ruminate over while staring up at the ceiling plagued by insomnia.

But it seems, he has been beaten to it.

Pushing open the glass door with a heavy prod of his cane, he moves into the lab and stands just beyond the threshold, frowning.

"Young ER meat stand you up?"

Cameron jumps and glances up at him over her glasses, before shaking her head and lowering her gaze back down to the papers in her hand. He doesn't miss that glittering green negates to scan the page, but rather remains shrouded defensively by heavy lashes in the simple act of avoiding his crystal stare.

He notes the windswept chaos of her hair.

Notes the way her legs are clad in tight denim rather than soft wool; her right leg lowered onto the ground and holding some of her weight, so as to avoid perching up on the high stool and putting pressure on her hip.

He surmises her side must still be tender.

He doesn't ask.

"Pouring over all that 'pretty blue cursive' won't do anyone any good now; the patient kicked the bucket at six forty-seven."

"... I know. Foreman and Hadley told me."

"Thirteen went running to my ex, disgraced protégé?"

"Actually, she was sitting down... Disgraced?"

"The woman rapidly cooling three floors below us would suggest so."

"... It wasn't my case."

"Then why are you here?"

"Because... Because I needed to remind myself that you're an _asshole_. There's nothing here, House... For _me_ to feel bad because I may have missed something after five minutes spent glancing over a series of notes and a vial of blood is one thing- pathetic; not my preferred term, but the one you would use for the phenomena, I'm sure- but for _you_ to come here and suggest that your patient's passing is somehow _my_ fault... That's... That's..."

"That's what? Go on... What is it, Dr Cameron?"

"It's... I..."

"Yes?"

"...Why do you do this to me?"

She sighs, as she finally looks up from the paper in her hands; her expression weary and defeated. Her eyes remain dry however, the greying doctor notes, and her exhaustion seems to be born more out of agitation than hurt.

"Call you up on your flaws?"

"My flaws?... Well, you do excel at it, I agree, but that's not what this is. I have plenty of them, and I'm sure you could reel off several more I've foolishly forgotten about, but your patient dying on you has nothing to do with _me_ -"

She snaps, shoving the papers across the counter and pushing herself to her feet to regard him irritably.

"-You know... You had _four_ doctors working on this case, House, as well as your own _brilliant_ mind... Your team must really suck if none of them are worth your time to ague with..."

"None of _them_ are currently here, semi-tipsy, and pretending they're not about to roll over and expose their belly for a beating like the naughty little puppy-dog they are. You missed something, Cameron-"

"-No! _You_ did!"

"It was a reaction. It's not _my_ specialty."

"And it's not _my_ problem!... I left you to go take temperatures and put on band-aids, remember?"

And she's close now, having made her way slowly over to the door during their altercation. She stands before him; green eyes cast up at him to hold his gaze with heated anger, and he has only seen her like this several times before. On each of those occasions, he had let her take the reigns- let her have her way- because she is smart beneath her tendency to submit to empathy and the dominance of others, and the passion that drives her infrequent anger has proven justified in the past. This is different though; this has nothing to do with a patient- at least it doesn't as far as _she's_ concerned- and he supposes that she's right... He _has_ found himself lacking in someone to berate in quite the same way as he has always done to her.

Her teeth flash in a dangerous shock of sharp white, and he muses that whomever proposed the notion of blonde locks lending their owner an angelic sense of innocent naivety couldn't have been more wrong... Her anger is raw, and the tempestuous darkness in her eyes is only enhanced by the icy tumbling of her tresses, and he wonders if she has any idea how beautiful she is to him right now.

Not that it matters.

Beauty is something he cannot accept from her.

...But the electric heat of her anger _is_ , and he catches first a small glimmer of disquiet, then confusion, then- finally- realisation, as he holds her gaze silently, before leaning in with clear intent.


	18. Chapter 18

He brushes his lips against hers softly, but only for a second. After all, his decision is not born from anything so tender, and he swiftly deepens his assault as he moves to press her up against the glass wall of the lab that spills eery light into the darkness of the deserted hallway. Her breath catches audibly, and it is more through shock than anything else that her parted lips allow him entrance, but he takes the opportunity before it can be revoked.

The rough scruff of the older doctor's jaw scratches against her chin, and Cameron squeezes her eyes shut as she tries to catch the dwindling string of her sanity and understand what the actual holy fuck is going on. A strong hand runs up the side of her coat to rest high against her ribs and she shakes her head and shoves her own hands against the sinewy planes of House's chest and pushes him off of her. The greying doctor loses his footing in the process and staggers back with little grace, and dark anger about the fact.

Still, the look of dull contempt he throws his long ago coffee-maker and note-scribbler pales considerably to the bright anger that dances in green eyes marred with confusion.

"What the hell are you _doing_?"

She hisses at him, and he notes with mild intrigue the slight redness his assault has left around her mouth.

"I-"

"-Is this your idea of a _joke?_ "

Oh, and she _is_ angry; he can tell by the way she remains backed against the wall with her teeth clenched and breath shuddering audibly from her nose.

Still... A joke?

No, not a joke.

But then, what _had_ it been?

He doesn't know, and this just serves to ignite his own irritation. After all, _she_ had been the one standing much too close. Daring him. Challenging him. All those heated looks over the past few years; hadn't they just been _asking_ for something like this to happen? His head spins with several images at once; each battling for dominance and creating an obscure web of intangible wisps of recall.

His proclamation that she was unable to touch him all those years ago; the electricity between them almost nauseating as she had regarded him with that unnervingly wide-eyed attention he could never quite get used to... But neither found wholly unpleasant.

His anger- and it _had_ been anger- at the sordid words of the oncologist and his insipid patient when discussing their upcoming- and eventually catastrophic- date. The way they had goaded him and coerced him to fuck her, as if they'd thought she was just any other girl.

Mostly though, it's the taste of mixed alcohol that lingers now on his tongue, and the flash of her sat casually back on her sofa offering him a grin, and his subconscious's reaction to such pretty indifference later on through sleep.

"House!?"

Her sharp bark shakes him from his reverie, and her demand for an answer he doesn't have sparks that old, familiar breed of irritation. The one that she is not the _only_ person to elicit that particular breed of poison from him, but she is most certainly the _master_ of the art.

She has always been able to push his buttons, just as he does to her, and he knows the words that leave his mouth will scathe her even before he is aware of what he means to say.

"What? Was that not _good_ for you, Dr Cameron? Not quite what you'd had in mind? After years of pathetic yearning after a self-certified asshole, you're shocked at his behaviour? Or was your vision on how it would finally go filled with romance? Beauty fixing the Beast? Perhaps the idea of being with someone that would berate you and mistreat you was romantic in itself? Something straight out of a novel? But not so fun in real life?"

"I don't-"

"-You liked the _idea_ of being with someone broken, but the reality of how they might treat you isn't as perfect, is it? What is it? What's wrong? Haven't you been _waiting_ for me to want you? How many relationships have you pushed aside because of that irritating little flame you've held for me that you just can't quite bring yourself to blow out? Don't look at me like that, you know it as well as I do, or you wouldn't _be_ here right now. As you said, it has nothing to do with the _patient_... So tell me? You know how I work better than most- I will allow you that- and the way I finally give you what you want _shocks_ you? You know not to expect more from me... Unless you believed I would behave differently just for _you_..."

He supposes if he'd been the one drinking instead of the blonde, he might have more ammunition to carry on, but his words have begun to cycle in his mind, and he doesn't think he has any venom left. Doesn't even _entirely_ understand why he bit her in the first place. Reasoning is irrelevant, though; he can see his brand of toxin take effect and spread, and there is no way of sucking it out now.

He opens his mouth to say something more on the matter- something less cruel- but finds nothing but silence.

"I have to go."

Cameron informs him numbly; her voice bland and emotionless.

Watching as she slips from the room with a slight woodenness to her walk, House sighs and rubs his hand roughly against his lips; meshing them harshly against his teeth.

"Fuck."

He offers the eery stillness of the room, before bringing his cane down against the shining plastic of one of the stools with full force. It creates a dull sound, and his hands tingle painfully as the shock reverberates up the unyielding wood to spite him.

He regrets what he's said now that it's too late to rectify the fact, and this is a dilemma he is uncomfortably familiar with when it comes to Cameron, although he would never admit to such a thing. Still, what he has said to her tonight is unlike what he's said to her before, and he doesn't entirely know what to do now.

He _could_ just leave it. Things might be tense for a couple of weeks when passing the young doctor in the hospital, but she is not a member of his staff, and if he were to put in a little effort, he could most likely avoid her entirely. Plus, he doesn't think for a second that she would relay his words unto either of her old colleagues.

She is proud. She hides it well, but he has seen things that lead him to know that it's true.

"Go home and let it lie. At least for now."

He murmurs gruffly to the empty ghosts of the sterile room, before limping slowly down the hall towards the women's changing rooms.

After all, just as Cameron knows him well, he knows her ways better than she might believe.

* * *

Pushing the door open, he confirms what he already knows, and slips into the harsh light of the room with a sigh. Listening out for sounds of additional life, he concludes it to be just the two of them and wedges his cane against the handle for the door.

"Generally, when people proclaim they need to go, they mean further than ten metres down the hall."

He offers quietly; crystal blues trained sharply on the young doctor.

She sits on the floor with her back pressed against the low bench that centres the militant lines of lockers; her knees drawn up and her face hidden against them.

Walking over with a pronounced lilt to his gait due to the loss of his cane, House takes a seat on the bench beside her and scans the room without any real interest. Looking down into a thick sea of tumbling gold, he observes his ex-protégé for movement, but is left disappointed. He has the childish urge to prod at her shoulder incessantly until she is forced to acknowledge him, but holds it sensibly at bay. Instead, he lets his attention wander to the scooped hood of her coat, and gently pulls free several long, wavy hairs from the rough wool of the lining; letting them fall to the floor in curious glimmers of light.

"... You should know better than to listen to the words of an _asshole_ and take them to heart, Dr Cameron. You're smarter than that."

"... And smart enough to know that you meant them."

She replies quietly; her words muffled against the denim of her jeans.

House sighs, and stretches his legs out in front of him with a low groan.

"Most of them. Most were simply the truth. But the truth doesn't always need to be _addressed_. It was unnecessary to voice things we've both cordially decided to keep unspoken. But then, I am the beast, remember? It's what I do... All those times I advised you that it was unwise to like me... I didn't do that for the _hell_ of it. You think if I didn't at least tolerate you a _little_ \- spare your feelings just a _touch_ of consideration- I would have bothered? You think I turned you down for any other reason than the fact that I found you a reasonable human being?... Albeit it rudely shrouded with favourable genetics..."

"You hate confrontation."

"Yes. And I could have just fired you. But I didn't."

"Then why did you... Why did you kiss me?"

"Well... I can't fire you anymore... Not without putting in far more effort than I would deem entertaining."

"Exactly."

"... Perhaps I just wanted to..."

"... What?..."


	19. Chapter 19

_"What?"_

Cameron raises her head from the comforting fort of her knees but doesn't look around. Still, House can spy the line of her jaw and the downward curve of her mouth from his seat on the bench and he allows himself to believe that she looks more confused than she does angry. _Fortunately_. She has always intrigued him when she's shown whatever brief spats of fury she will allow herself, but this situation feels different to him and he is perplexed to find that he doesn't relish the idea of her retaliating against his own recent outburst.

What she might choose to say would be interesting...

But he knows deep down that it would hurt.

 _Ah, but isn't_ that _a grand display of hypocrisy._

Yes. It is. And he places a hand gently on her shoulder before he can think better of it; removing it as though scalded when she stiffens beneath his touch.

He wants to tell her he's sorry. He wants to offer her just those two, simple words.

But he can't.

He's never been able to tell her outright how miserable he feels once he's attacked her for little or no reason other than that she allows him to.

"Why would you want to?"

She asks with a frown, and House finds himself unable to hide a small breath of laughter despite the awkward tension that looms over them like thunder.

It's just- if taken entirely outside of the context that has led them here and pinkend the blonde's eyes- her confusion would be endearingly amusing. Shrugging when she shoots him a wounded glance in response to his laughter- and oh, he wants to tell her to lighten up and that it's not at her expense, but he supposes he can understand _why_ she might be on the defensive at present- he placates patiently.

"Cameron, there's a whole host of reasons why I pushed you away; some good, some not. There's never been any reason I haven't wanted to kiss you."

"Typical."

She responds eventually in a small, prim voice, and then he is absolutely astounded when she laughs herself.

"Well, men only want one thing."

He advises solemnly, aware that he skates on thin ice but never able to cut himself off entirely when it comes to poking at the young doctor in the hopes that she'll show him her teeth.

"Some do."

She agrees cooly, before playing him at his own game and calling him out pensively- still averting her attention towards the lockers.

"You don't."

"I see. You're a psychiatrist now. Well, I suppose working in the ER leaves you some extra time to study up on new talents in order to curb the boredom a life devoid of-"

"-Of you? You think think my life has become _boring_ because you're not in it every waking moment?"

"... Has it?"

"It's... I've never slept so well."

"That's hardly an answer."

"It's entirely off subject."

She snaps, and he nods slowly while hiding a slight smirk.

"If you only wanted one thing, you wouldn't have kissed me."

"How do you figure that? Seems like the very definition of wanting one thing."

"No. I know that you really _do_ realise- begrudgingly, I'm sure- that I've never sat merging our names onto my medical notes, nor imagined what you might look like in a suit on our wedding day."

"Suits make me look gangly."

"Everything does... If you had just wanted sex, there were times, several of them, when I pretty much offered you it. I've even kissed you once-"

'-Yes, I'm not sure cunning ploys to stab me with a syringe count as an amorous interlude."

"You kissed back. And I would have thought that might be just your thing."

"Is it yours? Oh god, please tell me you-"

"-I'm not telling you anything. You've made fun of me for years over what you presume I might or might not enjoy, think, feel or know. I get it, it's what you _do_. But, sometimes I get tired of taking it. That's not because I'm weak, or pathetic or any of the other things you said. It's because you hound me. You enjoy sticking the knife in my side and seeing just how slowly you can twist until I fold. I _know_ that. I've _always_ known that. I never thought I would _change_ you- why do you think I left?"

"You look better in pink?"

"Ha. And here I always thought you appreciated the fitted pants."

"I do recall commenting on them once or twice, but then that was simply my duty as your boss. Boosting morale."

"Right."

She smiles, and he is _pleased_ that she's smiling but he has no clue where this leaves them. Her comment that she's offered herself up to him in the past sits in the air between them tangibly, and not just because he currently wonders- contemplating the sharp lines of her profile- why he'd passed them by.

 _You_ know _why!_

It's out there now. She's left those words out in the open.

Clearing his throat, he makes to throw her an underhand comment to break through the heaviness of the moment, before she continues quietly; finally looking at him.

"I guess when a knife was quite literally stuck into my side, you surprised me, though."

"Well... The cleaning staff work hard around here; seemed a little rude to risk you messing up their floor."

"Hey. I'm glad."

"Yes, I'm sure Juanita and Marcella are too."

"Actually, it's Janice and Larry. No, I mean, I'm glad you did what you did. You were worried about me."

"Never."

"Before, back when I found the way I felt about you hard to deal with, you told me several times that you didn't want to hurt me. To crush me. And I know, coming from you, those were pretty big words, but I still couldn't help but think mostly you were telling me that as you thought it was the quickest way to shut me up. I guess it _was_ the best way... I never minded- honestly- whether you cared for me or not. I would have _liked_ you to, of course. I would have _really_ liked you to. But, I figured I was never going to know whether you really _did_ , and it didn't change the fact that _I_ liked and cared about _you_. I was fine with it. Not always _happy_ with it, but resigned to the way things were and content. I guess now I know you actually _do_ care about me a little... And you can think whatever you want about the fact that something like that matters to me, but you won't make me any less happy about it."

"... I'm not going to rain all over your parade. Not when it took a violent stabbing to make you happy the first time. Who _knows_ what will have to occur to beat that."

She laughs at this, and it's a laugh he remembers witnessing often when she and the boys had been immersed in amiable conversation, but it had rarely been directed towards him back then. He'd made her nervous, and, if he's honest, he supposes he had infrequently _allowed_ her anything to laugh about. His best offer back when she'd worked beneath him had been a polite giggle, or- more often- a derisive yet amused exhalation most often accompanied by a rolling of her eyes. The more relaxed husky chuckling she offers him now is still rather new to their troubled relationship, but it's a breed he's entirely in favour of. It's both strangely, well, familiar- _comfortable_ \- and just a little bit sexy, and he supposes that she's right in saying it's always going to be more than just one thing between them.

"In fact, while on the topic of tradition-"

"-we weren't talking about trad-"

"-I tend to find drinking in my office after the death of a patient loses some of it's usual appeal. Do you know the Tipping Cup?"

"On seventh?"

"Yes... _Tradition_ is to order Jim Beam blue label and lament a toast."

Regarding House silently for a minute, not sure whether it's a good idea or not, Cameron eventually casts her busy thoughts aside and pushes herself up to stand over him.

"Well. If it's tradition..."


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: A slight shift in the rules. Hope you enjoy and please review :)

Hesitating with her hand on the door of the Tipping Cup, Cameron bites her lip as she tries to prepare herself to enter. Following House's invitation, they'd not said anything much to each other rather than a blunt 'see you there' before taking their leave. After that, she'd simply followed him out of the women's locker room and down the hall and into the elevator; final destination- the hospital car park.

House had still appeared to be favouring four wheels over two, and she'd turned the key in her rather outdated Ford to let hot air billow out from the vents before tailing him through the barriers and out onto the street. As soon as they'd been clear of the hospital grounds, he'd revved the engine and sped off. She'd rolled her eyes but refused to give chase. She supposes the fact that she'd once been fairly big on burning some rubber herself would be one of those little titbits House would go nuts for. As such, she has kept this- along with so many _other_ things- close to her chest in the hopes of saving them for a rainy day. It is a pathetic practice, and she's told herself this numerous times, but it is one she adheres to all the same; partly on purpose and partly out of the simple habit of being extremely reserved when it comes to her private life.

She is still a little astounded that she'd let House in on the base facts of her family set up.

 _Come to think of it, I'm pretty astounded by_ most _of the stuff that's happened of late._

Running a finger over the soft curve of her bottom lip, she holds her breath and pushes open the door of the dimly lit bar.

The late hour means that while several of the women hovering around the bar are clad in very little to expose model thin frames and delicate bone structure, a couple more are dressed similarly to how she is herself and have clearly come to join the late night drinkers following senseless hours of a work shift. She spies House perched up on one of the stools in the very darkest corner surrounding the expensive copper counter, talking to one of the pretty bar flies wrapped up in a skimpy swatch of scarlet. Walking over, she waits a couple of feet away hesitantly, not sure whether to interrupt for fear of earning herself a snide remark she could do without.

As it is, House cuts his conversation with the leggy brunette short and beckons the young doctor over.

"Unclench, Cameron. You look like you're worried you're going to get into trouble for being out past your curfew."

"Well, it _is_ late."

She offers lamely, taking up a seat next to his and flashing the woman in the red dress a shy smile as the latter assesses her openly. House watches on curiously, looking from the blonde to the intoxicated woman recently trying to bum a smoke. Waiting for the brunette to leave, he smirks as he shakes his head and mutters gruffly

"I told her I was waiting for my hooker to show up."

"... Nice."

"Relax, I don't think she bought it."

"If that's your way of complimenting me, I don't-"

"-Complimenting you? No. I'm telling you you're not believable as a hooker. If that constitutes a compliment in your eyes then you have some _serious_ problems."

House remarks solemnly and Cameron glowers at him as she wiggles to get a little more comfortable in her seat, lamenting cooly

"I think the vast _majority_ of my problems are staring me right in the face."

"Ah, well, I never forced you to come out with me."

"No. I know. I'm glad you asked me."

She shrugs, and House rolls his eyes to draw attention away from the tick in his jaw as the blonde goes about making things awkward as she so often does. Looking from Cameron to the girls now chattering away to each other animatedly- lipstick flickering over whitened teeth and collarbones rippling beneath expensive fabric- he enquires curiously

"Have you ever come here? Like that?"

"Underfed and drunk? No. Sorry."

She sighs, and House ponders slender features and hollow cheeks but says nothing. He's not in the mood to pick at her too much; a very faint smudge of mascara shadowing her left eye, tracked there by salt.

"I guess I don't get out much in _any_ guise."

Cameron continues as she waits for the greying doctor to herald over one of the immaculately groomed barmen.

"I've only come here once before."

"Who with?"

"Amelia."

"Amelia? That sounds like a girl's name."

"There's no getting anything past _you,_ is there?"

The blonde sighs, and House leans over the bar to order two double shots of Beam before turning back to the young doctor with a smirk.

"I live in hope, Cameron. Now, are you going to make all my dreams come true and tell me about the sordid escapades you and Amelie g-"

"-Amelia. She went to my school and found me on one of those Alumni things. She had a thing for my brother when we were kids. We met up, she asked after him, I told her it wasn't going to happen and we endured a painfully awkward glass of wine and parted ways."

"... You really need to work on your storytelling technique. At least one, if not _both_ of you should have been donning the Princess Leia slave girl outfits in this scenario. And-"

"-House."

She warns, and he gives up with a shrug, sliding her one of the generous tumblers of bourbon.

"To certain death."

He toasts, and she sighs deeply but touches her glass to his and adds

"To brief mortality."

Raising an eyebrow and watching as the blonde drinks, House eventually knocks back his own and signals for another.

"Aren't you driving?"

Cameron asks, and he growls at her to leave him be; telling her he's glad to be shot of her infuriating ways before he can stop himself. She merely looks at him, realising her _own_ head is a little fuzzy and belatedly recalling the wine consumed earlier. She considers asking him _why_ he's invited her here with him if he finds her company so toxic, and decides against it. She contemplates smoothing over the lull in their already stilted conversation with the reminder that her apartment is close by and that they can leave their cars in the lot where they are.

Instead, she goes with what she knows.

She talks business.

While inwardly wondering how many more snide comments she's going to have to suffer before she can get rid of the small and earnest flutter of hope that sits low in her stomach when dealing with House.

"When I looked over the patient files, I still couldn't see where we went wrong."

She muses, and House glances at her from the side of his eye before contemplating his glass moodily.

"Leave it, Cameron. _'We'_ didn't go wrong anywhere. This isn't your fault. If you want me to _apologise_ for pinning things on you then-"

"-No."

"No?"

"Well, I mean... That's not why I brought it up. An apology _would_ be nice though, I guess."

"Too late. Moment's gone."

"Mmm."

She sighs, but not without a mild hint of amusement as she can read between the lines, and his mentioning that she shouldn't count herself in with his team in terms of their unfortunate failure speaks volumes.

_I guess the thing with House is I've just always known what to listen out for._

"It was just bad luck."

He admonishes gruffly, and she touches the tip of her tongue to her top lip- tasting bourbon- and challenges boldly

"Sure. Except you don't _really_ think that. Your patient died and you need to know _why_."

"Yes."

He agrees

"But for me, it's my job."

"It's an obsession."

"... So what does that make it for _you_? You miss the thrill, and yet you can't even admit it."

He muses, and Cameron regards him morosely, feeling the effect of the liquor beginning to kick in, as well as the old familiar turbulence of their unhealthy back and forth. She studies the pull of his lips and thins her own, wishing that tonight could have gone differently and hating herself for it.

"I don't miss you."

She breathes quietly, and House locks her in his gaze mercilessly and stares her down, answering back finally

"I know. I pushed too hard."

Raising a brow in surprise, Cameron knocks back the last of her bourbon, before shaking her head; long curls tumbling prettily and snatching the attention of clear, blue eyes.

"I moved on."

She informs him, holding her breath as the barman to their right shouts out for last orders and House raises his hand with all four fingers raised. She looks over at the bar flies- pretty and free, demanding attention and not caring one bit- and back at her long ago mentor. Watches as the barman pours them their shots and House divvies them in half and slides her two, potentially dangerous fingers of the strong stuff. Watches his throat work as he shoots back first one then the other, before crystal blues fix on her intently and wait for her to follow suit.

Saying a brief prayer to no deity in particular, she knocks back her two shots before pushing herself from the bar and stalking for the door.

She doesn't need to look back to know that House follows her.

Doesn't need to point out that she lives only a block away.

He knows.

He always knows.

_I moved on._

She just hopes that she's right.

Slipping through the door into the night air, she watches as House throws a last glance at the girls by the bar and grits her teeth as she's suddenly not so sure about any of this.

 _It will be fine. You have a pull out bed. He's slept at yours before. You've shared a few drinks with him before. You're fine. He said it himself; he's the beast. You know this. Damn it, Allie, you_ know _this, and you're not goddamn_ stupid _enough to keep on playing with fire._

Troubled eyes flickering up to glance over at him, she locks in with House's own.

"Do you have anything for a nightcap?"

He asks, looking over at the all night stop'n'shop as they pass before imprisoning her once more.

"... I have stuff."

She confirms quietly, and she has the brief and strangest urge to murmur 'don't crush me, House', but instead she simply turns left into her street and leads them up to the main door without a word.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Hope you enjoy :) Reviews would be lovely! :)

Letting them both into her apartment, Cameron flicks the light switch before asking House what he wants to drink. She does so merely to break the heavy silence that has followed them in from their tense elevator ride up to her floor, and she waits expectantly for an answer. In all honesty, she doesn't think another drink is wise. She can't speak for House, but her own mind is a little hazy with the wine and Jim Beam from earlier, and this mixed with the obscurity of their evening is putting some pretty strange thoughts into her head.

"Bourbon."

He replies, helping himself to a seat on her sofa. She nods and pours him a healthy measure of Jack Daniels, not bothering to ask him how he takes it. She's seen him help himself to the stash he keeps around the office enough times to simply add a couple of cubes of ice and bring it over.

House accepts the glass with a loaded stare, capturing her attention and keeping her momentarily trapped in his gaze before taking a sip of his drink. He considers telling her that Jack Daniels is barely fit to consider itself a beverage, let alone something one might offer a guest, but he is actually a little surprised she has anything of the sort in her apartment at all. He supposes it makes sense, given that he knows from overheard conversations that she and the old gang still spend a fair amount of time together, and he would imagine something like JD might be exactly up the wombat's street.

_Chase. Or any other men she brings back here._

The thought sits oddly with him and he pushes it aside. Looking up to where she still hovers in the kitchen he growls gruffly

"Aren't you having anything?"

She opens her mouth to tell him that she's not sure if she should before stopping herself. She imagines this might be the sort of thing House might mock her for- calling her overly cautious and sensible and all of the other things she supposes she is, but wishes she wasn't- and in the end she pours herself a couple of fingers of gin and takes a seat perched on the coffee table in front of him.

"Cheers."

She smiles dryly, eyes flickering up to the clock in the kitchen and making it to be getting on for one in the morning.

_What is this? What are we doing drinking so late?_

_Maybe I should have suggested he call a cab._

She frets silently, nursing her gin. It hits her hard as it chases the Beam downed in the bar, and she grimaces before admitting apologetically

"I've never been that great with mixing my drinks. Help yourself to more, but I'm going to sip at this one."

"And they say doctors are supposed to be wild after hours."

House laments, but he doesn't push further. He's fairly surprised she'd kept up with him back at the bar, especially as he's sure he'd tasted wine on her tongue when he'd kissed her.

_When I kissed her..._

Studying the blonde intently, he takes in the wary cast of her expression and sighs.

"I can't decide which I dislike more..."

"Hmm?"

She raises a brow inquisitively, and House downs the remaining amber in his glass before limping over into her small kitchenette to retrieve the rest of the bottle.

"The looks you give me."

"What looks do I give you?"

She frowns, but that wariness and unease increases in her eyes, and he shakes his head as he falls back into the sofa opposite her and nips from the neck of the bottle.

"Mostly it's hope. You look at me sometimes like a child hoping for praise-"

"-Well, I worked under you. I was trying to do a good job. I just-"

"-No. The _others_ were trying to do a good job. To earn a few gold stars. You wanted _more_ than that."

"I wanted validation for my work... You made me work harder than the others for that."

"Sometimes."

He admits, seeing no use in denying it. He'd liked making her work for it. He'd liked seeing how much she could take before she cracked. He's not proud of it, but he's not oblivious to the fact either.

"The hope you showed me was something I knew I couldn't give you. Sometimes that angered me and sometimes it irritated me. I never liked it when you looked at me that way, but I found myself... Lacking it. When you left."

"...Do you miss me?"

She asks quietly, and the silence that follows is long and dead and still.

"What's the other look I give you?"

She asks eventually, accepting that she's not going to get an answer, and yet wondering if the lack of a response might be just as telling as the words he will never say.

"The opposite of hope. Resignation."

"And you don't like that? You're a misanthropist. I would have thought _you'd_ find resignation healthy."

"It is when it's warranted."

"You think my resignation that you're going to try and make me feel like crap if there's any way that you can is _unwarranted_?"

"I think the fact that you stick around given that you'll _admit_ that's what you expect from me is unhealthy."

"... I quit. Remember?"

"I do. And yet... Here we are."

He opens his palms out to her as though in defeat and she frowns. She wants to tell him that it's a bit fucking _late_ for a psych session. She wants to ask him why he's telling her all this. She wants to ask him why- just _why_ \- he treats her the way he does if he cares for her the way he sometimes seems to.

"You didn't _have_ to come home with me."

She reprimands softly, and he wishes she wouldn't say things like that because he's still not entirely sure why he's come here himself. The soft fall of her curls and the familiar angles of her body- always leant in just a little, open, attentive... offering- answer this question as well as he presumes it can ever be answered and he leans back into the pillows and pops a vicodin between his lips.

He chases it down with bourbon and waits for her to scold him.

She sips at her gin silently, watching the ripple of his throat.

Her teeth nip at the glass as she waits for him to say something, and he thinks back on the girls at the bar and the way they'd looked at him.

_Pity. They all look at me with pity. Or thinly veiled disdain, if I'm lucky. But, they know me there, or at least, they know my type. I don't wear the coat, but the late hour and the pager clipped to my jeans reek of doctor. They look at me and see a one night stand and meal ticket. Some might even dig the cane thing. Mostly though, it's the wage bracket they're seeing and the clear image of a man who has no better option waiting for him anywhere else. They see an old, bitter man. They see an easy pass to whatever medicine they require for their own damage; a finger up to daddy, a free drink, an end to a dry spell, or of course, just medicine itself._

_I disgust them in some mild, unimportant way, and that's good, as it's a mutual disgust._

_You've never looked at me that way..._

No. Cameron has never looked at him that way. He's not sure if that makes her a saint or a fool.

Perhaps a little of both.

Remembering the way the girls had then looked at the young blonde- assessing, judging, rejecting- he smiles as he contemplates the bottle in his hand and asks curiously

"Were you popular at school?"

"...Why?"

"Why the deflection?"

"I'm not de-... No. I know that probably surprises you as it doesn't fit into the picture you've painted of me, but-"

"-It doesn't surprise me at all."

He grins, and she frowns in confusion

"Then why are you always going on about my social privilege and butterfly effect and whatever else?"

She asks, actually remembering the exact term he'd once used perfectly well, but not wanting to say it.

_Circle queen. Spoken like a true circle queen, he said. And that had stung._

"Oh, you have all the right parts of the puzzle to have been popular. You're pretty. You're skinny. You're... Does it require anything else in high school?"

He mocks, and she simply rolls her eyes; not about to jump to whatever bait he's trying to lay out for her. Shrugging at her lack of response, House continues

"You have _extra_ things too, though. You're smart. You're logical. You're naïve."

"Clearly we had different high school experiences-"

"-Well, unless you _also_ slept with the entire cheer team, and let me just say, I would-"

"-Naivity was pretty strong in that crowd."

She shuts him down smoothly. He carries on unfazed

"Sure. If we're talking _street_ smarts. Now, you're no _Foreman_ when it comes to those, but I would have fired you years ago if you had none to speak of at all."

"Yeah, well, I had to learn fast once I realised breaking and entering was going to be a large part of my job."

"So corrupt."

"The very worst."

She smiles thinly, and he nods as though in agreement and points out

"I didn't mean you were clueless. Maybe that would have made things easier for you to fit in with that sort of person. I meant you were- _are_ \- emotionally naive. You expect the best out of everybody because that's what you give yourself. In a world where it's survival of the fittest and every pretty girl is a shark waiting for a gossip feeding frenzy, you would have been a very small, very cautious fish. Am I right?"

"...Well. It beats some of your other analogies. And it's a fun step on from mammal comparisons I suppose. I can't _wait_ 'til your picking apart of my character reaches a reptilian level."

She sighs and he smirks at her indulgently, suddenly understanding why it is he's never rid himself of her despite knowing it would be better for both of them if he did.

Rewarding her sarcasm with a hint of something besides that, he asks her casually

"Were you intimidated by the girls in the bar earlier?"

"House."

She warns, throwing him a warning glance to suggest she really isn't interested in playing into his wish to dissect her much longer.

"I wouldn't ask if I didn't find your answer interesting."

He points out, and she pulls a face that says it all.

_Sure. But interesting how? Interesting because you want to know how I feel, or interesting to pull apart and latch onto? Interesting to use for later ammunition._

"No. I wasn't intimidated. I just felt out of place."

"Underdressed?"

"Over-dressed. Different. A different style or whatever you want to call it. They look at _you_ and they see a guy to go talk to and _get_ stuff from-"

She says it slightly apologetically but with a hint of shy defiance, and he swallows as she's hit the nail on the head of his earlier thoughts perfectly.

"-they look at _me_ and they see a lesser version of their species. I'm not saying that's how I feel. Just that that's what they see. I have no wish to look and act like they do, but it's still uncomfortable to be scrutinised for daring to walk among them."

"Hmm."

House offers, intrigued by her answer. Looking around her apartment and its tasteful, low key decor, he smiles.

"Is it strange? Going from one world where you're Queen Bee to the other where you can't connect?"

"No."

She sighs, reminding him patiently

"Only _you_ see it that way as it gives you good grounds for ridicule. I was never Queen Bee working for you. I just happened to be the only one on our side of the glass with a vagina."

"There you go making bold claims again, Dr Cameron."

House warns, and she grins, sipping at her gin with a shrug

"Who knows. Maybe I'm wrong."

Miming shock, the greying doctor offers her a conspiring wink before pointing out gruffly

"You may have been a strange and exotic creature with breasts- sort of- back when I owned you, but now you're just one of many. _Now_ you spend your day _surrounded_ by a swarm of cotton-candy pink worker drones. You're still the Queen Bee down in the hive at the ER. They flock to you."

"Flamingoes would work better with 'flock'. And I'm Head Attending. They 'flock' to me for work."

"Some of them. Some have their own work agenda. I'm not talking about who's in charge of what clipboard. I'm talking about simple magnetism. They flock to you- swarm to you, whichever you prefer- because you're the prettiest girl in the room. It's pathetic, but it's human nature."

He shrugs, and she contemplates her gin pensively, wishing for another shot right about now and knowing it would be a bad move.

"You think I'm..."

She trails off. She can feel herself blushing and hates herself for it. She searches for something caustic to throw back at him to continue their recent banter and dispel the sudden awkwardness that has reached new heights between them.

House waves away her failed efforts with a blunt affirmation

"I think you're the prettiest girl in _most_ rooms. I've told you that enough times... Now, with _Thirteen_ around, it's an interesting battle for the title but-"

"-Why do you say things like that to me?"

She interrupts him quietly, and he opens his mouth to give her an impatient answer before noticing with some surprise that she looks hurt rather than flattered at what had been meant as a simple expression of fact.

"You don't want me to tell you I think you're attractive?"

"... Not tonight."

"Oh, I'm sorry. Would next Wednesday be better?"

He sarks, and she looks up from her glass at him angrily and calls him out

"How about just not on a night where you've berated me, assaulted me, and given me a run down on what you think of me?"

"I was trying to-"

"-Well don't. You've tried and succeeded _plenty._ Please. The last hour or so has been nice. Could you just for once- just _once_ \- not ruin that?"

"I-... Sure."

He agrees solemnly, glancing down at the bottle in his hand and placing it slowly on the table beside the blonde.

"I wasn't _trying_ to ruin anything. I was just making some observations."

"I know... It's just usually your observations sting a little."

She admits with a small smile, and he steeples his fingers under his jaw and regards her thoughtfully.

"You have to be just about the _only_ woman that would find being called popular with her peers and attractive a barb in their side."

"Women are complicated."

She smiles thinly, mimicking his earlier sweeping statement of men only wanting one thing. He nods and says with an audible note of admiration

" _You_ certainly always have been."

"I guess. But I wouldn't say I am right now... You're right, you've called me attractive a number of times in the past, but always as the element of something bigger; either to mock, or to hurt, or to pick me apart. It was never just to be nice, or because it was at the base of what you were trying to say. It was always just a part of some larger _analysis_."

"...You want me to simply tell you you're pretty? To make such a pointless observation with no deeper thought?"

"It would have been nice, yes."

She laughs quietly, appealing to him wearily

"For a long time, I would have liked you to just be _nice_ to me. But you're right. That's not how you operate. And I guess it's not what I need either. I no longer want that from you. I don't expect it... But sometimes it can still hurt a little. Because it _was_ something I really wanted from you. I just wanted you to like me."

"I do like you."

He admits, surprising himself and throwing the bottle that rests beside her a distrustful glance.

"...I know. I guess that's just not enough for me."

She admits after a long stretch of silence, and he regards her intently as she meets his eyes cooly, and he thinks back on how she'd tasted like wine and iron, and how her blood had smeared the bathtub. He thinks back on how she'd trembled with rage against him in the lab, and how she'd answered the door to him in her pyjama shorts and smiled.

He thinks on what she'd said earlier; that she's offered herself to him.

He thinks of all the hundreds- thousands- of ways this could go wrong, and reaches forward for her hand.

She studies him quizzically, looking down at where his fingers grip firmly at her own, before her eyes widen in surprise when he pulls her up and towards him assertively.

"House..."

She appeals warily, but she moves her weight onto him with a careful avoidance of his thigh that speaks of a coherent assessment of the situation and results in her sitting almost flush against him.

"You told me to stop treating you as though you might break... Am I going to regret it if I do?"

He asks her gruffly, fully aware of the physical reaction her new position has awoken in him as he looks up into green eyes sternly.

Her answer is a long time in coming- silence drawing out between them almost like a living, injured thing- but when she finally gives it to him, she does so with a slow brushing of her lips against his, and he takes this as an affirmation to proceed.

He takes it as a cue to open Pandora's box.


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So, I guess I should apologise profusely as it's been very close to a year since this fic was last updated. I stopped writing it for a couple of reasons; initially as less and less people seemed to read and comment on House fics, but also as I was going through some stuff that made me conflicted about writing this at the time. I deliberated about explaining further but have decided not to on here, but if anyone wants to know more, you're welcome to message me :) Or, just message me anyway!
> 
> From now on, this fic will be updated more frequently (I'm talking multiple times a month, what is this maddness?!) so I hope those of you that enjoyed it before rejoin me for the ride :) New readers, Hi! I will do my best to get this story going again and running smoothly) Thanks for reading, and reviews would be really appreciated!

For a long time, neither of them makes a sound; their kiss soft, but no longer shy. For House, this stark contrast to how he usually goes about things- how he has _always_ gone about things since Stacy left- is almost unbearable as it forces him to consider that he is perhaps the more vulnerable of the two of them right now, and this is not a position he often finds himself in when dealing with Cameron. Still, he allows the moment to last for just a little longer, everything that he had said to her back in the lab playing through his mind, and when he reaches up to cup her cheek, he does so gently.

Finally, she pulls back, and he thinks for a moment that she's going to tell him that this is a mistake, but she tastes like liquor and everything forbidden, and her pupils are blown as she studies him intently.

"Is this going to be comfortable for you on the sofa?"

Is all she asks, confirming where this is leading, and House stares her down as he contemplates the fact that for someone so slight, she feels wonderfully heavy- wonderfully _real_ \- sat on top of him. Her question is both reassuringly and infuriatingly true to character, and he pulls her back down to taste her roughly; warning her not to ruin this by scaring him off.

 _Because that's a very real possibility right now. I want this, I shouldn't, but I do, we_ both _do, but if you let me think about this- about_ you _\- too hard, I'm afraid that I'll do something unforgivable._

Unforgivable. He has never associated the term with the blonde before, simply because he has always basked in the belief that she will allow him anything. Now though, he's less certain. He's wary. He doesn't want her to say things- _Cameron_ things- that force him to consider their past and their relationship, because unlike the spite that so often drips from his tongue before he can stop it, this is an act he has always kept separate from the blonde. Sure, he has made numerous quips and suggestions, but mostly to irritate or embarrass her. Sex for himself for a great many years now has been a practice in self loathing and regret. It has been paid for, and meticulously uncaring. It is selfish and later tainted with a veil of disgust. He doesn't feel that way about Cameron- has _never_ felt that way about her- and so all jokes and innuendos aside, he realises now just how nervously he has held her at arms length in the past. It _hadn't_ simply been to keep things from getting complicated and therefor aggravating; she'd actually meant something to him.

Her earlier revelation that she has offered herself to him on several occasions burns into his skull as he nips the tip of her tongue lightly, and he finally understands how they've ended up where they are now.

He'd told her just now that he likes her, and realises with some surprise that this is the absolute truth, and he hopes that if she doesn't say or do anything he would usually berate and chide her for, then maybe- _maybe_ \- he can refrain from hurting her.

Fortunately, she seems to have understood at least a little of what's going through his head, as she doesn't prompt him for an answer. She had asked her question out of simple consideration, but she'd regretted the words as soon as they'd left her mouth. She'd asked to be kind, and knows that House is perfectly aware of this, but her words had carried the silent suggestion that they might otherwise retire to her bedroom, and she'd stiffened momentarily; afraid of what he might say to her to tease her.

So now she says nothing, simply allowing him to deepen their kiss as she threads her fingers into his hair and presses against him suggestively. House takes the hint and lowers his hands from her face in order to explore more intimate regions, grinning against parted lips as he catches a shudder of laughter when his hands single-mindedly move to her ass. Responding to her amusement with a pointed squeeze, he feels her laugh harder- shaking with it, but silent- and wonders suddenly if this might all end up alright after all.

"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't envisaged doing that once or twice."

He admits gruffly, and she smiles- he can feel it against his own lips, still pressed to hers- and replies smartly

"Likewise."

"Wait, me doing that to you? Or have I been underestimating you?"

"Grievously, and a little of both."

"You've fantasised about groping me?"

"What, I can't have dirty thoughts because I'm a woman?"

"No. You can't have dirty thoughts because you're _you_."

"Oh dear. This is going to be very educational for you."

The blonde smirks, sitting back and pulling her sweater off over her head, leaving her in just a thin scrap of cotton through which her bra is clearly visible. House swallows, thrown by her gall, before allowing his eyes to wander down. It occurs to him that he has only studied her in such a way recently to in order to vex her. Most often when he watches her, he does so curiously rather than hungrily.

Now though, he drinks her in intimately; assessing angles and curves usually hinted at but better covered. When she had worked for him, she'd shown a penchant for closely fitted shirts and sweaters, but her chosen style while on the job had always remained demure and professional, bordering on prim. The top she wears now is flimsy and hides very little, and after a couple more moments of consideration, he helps her out of it.

"Well."

He states, fingers travelling to her bra and touching the narrow band of lace encircling her ribs almost tentatively. He is aware that this proclamation is fairly lacking, and Cameron calls him on it with a small smile.

"Well?"

His eyes flicker up to meet hers, flashing irritably at her request he elaborate, and he notes that her smile is wary but not shy, for which he is grateful; he doesn't want to have to reassure her in case he accidentally discloses too much. In case he says something or calls her something that he knows he shouldn't because it would mean too much to her and he could never live up to the shift it would inevitably cause to their relationship.

_Not that things aren't shifting dramatically as it is..._

_Stop. Don't think about it... And it's different. This is sex- just_ sex _\- but if you tell her how she looks to you right now, it becomes more than that_.

"So far so good."

He smiles dryly, and he pretends not to notice the way the softness of her expression becomes just a little more guarded.

Still, when she leans back in to kiss him before working down the buttons of his shirt, he allows his thumb to stroke over delicate lace gently as his other hand disappears into her hair. Such tentative affection is short-lived however, as she surprises him with a bite to his lip, and he responds by lowering his attention down to her throat; breathing in the familiar smell of her and of her apartment as she shifts her weight to make him groan.

"Okay, take off your jeans before we get ahead of ourselves."

Cameron instructs, and House studies her with amused curiosity; the blonde's tone politely assertive as though simply asking him to read off the figures on one of his charts. He almost teases her for it- fairly certain that this particular topic won't be one she'll take offence to- but then she pushes herself up off of him so that he can comply with her demand and his eyes are level with her waist.

Level with the deep incision that had started the strangeness blossoming between them.

She has removed whatever gauze might have covered the injury after getting it stitched for the second time, and his eyes trail the thin, slightly curved line that runs just inside the peak of her hip. The stitches that have replaced the initial ones are less tidy than his had been, and he frowns as he'd guess she's going to end up with a more prominent scar. He supposes this might have happened either way given how she'd deemed it a good idea to abuse the laceration with a scalpel in the bathtub, and when he pushes himself up off the sofa, instead of removing his jeans, he touches his finger to her hip gently.

Green eyes flicker down and Cameron holds her breath, watching as House traces over the wound; featherlight. She opens her mouth to ask him what he's doing, but he cuts her off; this kiss different from the rest as his hand buried in her hair keeps her there with something deeper than sordid hunger.

And for this, she is elated, but she knows better than to say anything or allow herself to give in to him, so she simply enjoys the taste of the bourbon on his breath before moving her own hands pointedly down and unfastening his jeans herself. She pushes them down, along with his underwear, and feels him stiffen against her. For a moment she imagines he does so out of pleasure, but then it occurs to her that House's thigh remains an unspoken discomfort, especially between the two of them as he perpetually recoils from her ingrained concern.

Stepping back, she gives the uneven surface of his flesh a brief but pointed glance, before shrugging and returning her gaze to arresting blue.

"Has that Vicodin kicked in?"

"Why, do you want one?"

House replies a little aggressively, but she simply smiles and confides

"No thank you, I'm already a little inebriated."

And with that, she reaches behind her and unclasps her bra, before pushing down her underwear and regarding him expectantly.

"I was only asking so I'd know if it was alright to do this."

She explains, guiding him back onto the sofa none too gently and straddling him once more. It doesn't take much effort for her to do so as House remains momentarily dumbfounded at this swift progression; recalling all the times back when she'd openly fawned over him and his presumptions that she'd require a far more delicate hand than he was ever likely to possess.

"Was that not okay?"

She asks, sensing a slight change in the vibe between them, and the faint note of uncertainty in her voice brings back the familiarity recently lost through the pale offering of her body.

A thousand answers dance through House's mind, most of them arguably amusing but he is unsure if she'd appreciate any of them so he says nothing. He simply pulls her in to taste her hungrily and trusts the physical reaction to her lack of attire will assure Cameron that she needn't worry so much. His heart races as she takes him in her hand and blindly explores his length, before she lifts her hips and guides him with a shuddered breath as she lowers herself back down.

And then she begins to move.

Slowly at first, and House studies her intently as she keeps her eyes shut; noting minute changes in her expression as she gets used to him. It is not something he can recall a girl doing since the days when he'd first started experimenting as a teenager, and there is something sublimely intimate in watching the flicker of a frown touch her brow and the twitch to the side of her mouth as she remains otherwise silent and serene. He considers asking her if she's okay- wondering if this is something normal people do- but it seems preposterously out of character, and so instead he simply carries on watching her; mesmerised.

Finally, she begins to move faster, interrupting his voyeurism as she brushes her lips against his, and he reciprocates aggressively; striving to push away thoughts on the fact that he rarely feels the necessity- nor the inclination- to kiss his sexual partners as it only delays his release and asking them to leave him be. With Cameron, it's different; she tastes of liquor and a little of salt, and he knows that every small noise that escapes her mouth to get lost in his is entirely genuine.

Genuine, and intoxicating. She had been telling the truth when she'd professed not to scream or to moan when he'd teased her back in the examination room, and he finds himself relishing this fact. It is so far removed from his experiences over the last few years, and he reciprocates her more guttural expletives in kind as a warm ball of ecstasy begins to build in his gut.

Moving his hand down the flat plane of her stomach- careful to avoid the cut to her side- he increases her pleasure as he begins to fear she'll ruin him before long. She jerks violently in response, before laughing huskily and House groans, as the way this causes her inner muscles to flutter has him feeling light-headed. Picking up on this, Cameron grins, slowing her movements almost entirely in favour of simply flexing her stomach hard without warning and enjoying the positive reaction growled into her hair. At first she does it on purpose- taking charge of his bliss- but as House continues to tease her with a similar cruel slowness, she tenses and flexes at the mercy of his fingers as her nails dig desperate crescents into his shoulders.

Reaching the point of no return, House accompanies his release with sudden roughness to his touch and the blonde shudders with a low cry before tensing up completely; her head bowed with her teeth clamped over her bottom lip as his other hand grips her thigh hard enough to bruise.

"Fuck."

She breathes as she relaxes finally, and while he has heard her cuss out the others on a couple of rare occasions, it still tickles him to hear profanity fall from the blonde's lips.

Kiss-swollen lips; reddened by his scruff.

He regards her warily as she sits back and looks down at him with a sudden guardedness; her eyes obscurely dark with their pupils blown, but also nervous.

"Cameron..."

House starts, but he has no clue how to continue. His tongue burns with the taste of whisky- and a little hint of gin- and her flesh is warm and soft weighing over his.

"I know... Don't tell Wilson."

She tries to grin, before silence engulfs them damningly.


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I'm back from holiday so updates should be more regular again. That said, I will end this note reminding this will be a long fic as I'm aware that this is perhaps not the chapter that would be expected following the previous one (or perhaps it is, it is House haha). I promise this is all going somewhere, and I hope that it is at least in character. :) Reviews would be awesome, and more to come soon!

The silence stretches out, long and awkward, and Cameron swallows nervously as blue eyes that had moments ago been intense and fixated on her appreciatively now look carefully and dismissively past her. She lowers her own eyes, her lashes feeling heavy with liquor, and inexplicably with salt.

 _Not all_ that _inexplicably. I currently feel like I did when I was a kid and my mom would make her increasingly rare appearances to pick me up from school. Everyone knew, of course they did. Everyone knew who she was; who she was and who Mandy wasn't- Dom and I looked nothing alike. It shouldn't have mattered, but it did to me. Not who she was or our private family business, but how those other mothers looked at me. Or_ didn't _look at me, as it was. Looking past me, over me, like I'd done some terrible, embarrassing thing that offended them somehow. I grew up not to care what those stuck up bitches thought or felt about something I had no control over, but I remember that feeling, of course I do. Like I just wanted to sit on the floor and cry, but of course, that wasn't an option as I got older. So I kept it in, kept it down, and just worked through that awful feeling of dread and guilt. The kind that sits in your gut and makes you want to throw up... Yeah, that's where that salt is coming from._

Her gaze flickers to the crumpled heap of her jeans beside the couch, and she swallows. Shifting her weight uncomfortably, she silently begs House to look at her, to say something, but he remains detached and distant. Biting her lip, she finally pushes herself up, a little awkwardly and with an overwhelming feeling of uncertainty, and bends down to pick up her clothes that lay scattered on the floor.

House watches this cautiously out of the corner of his eye, drinking in pale limbs and various freckles and marks as the blonde gets dressed without saying a word. He notes that while he has always thought of her as skinny- worryingly so- this is mostly an illusion cast, presumably unwittingly, by her choice of wardrobe. She is remarkably slim, but she is slight; lean. Proportionate. Not as delicate as he has always considered her to be.

_Perhaps not, but you will always think of her that way._

He supposes he will. His attention returns once more to the deep incision marring her hip before the soft cotton of her top falls down to cover it. She bends down to pull up her jeans, and her hair hides her features from him, but he can tell just from the way she holds herself- the way she moves- that she's on edge. He knows that he needs to say something or do something, and that he can't just remain shut off to her, but he's not sure what to do or how to handle this. Watching dark denim slowly rise to hide the bare flesh of her thighs- intimate skin he should under no sane circumstance know hosts a spattering of freckles and a curious L shaped scar- he feels he has never been so uncertain about what to do that he can remember. He is hatefully apprehensive to speak to her incase he says something he shouldn't. He'd been on thin ice earlier in the lab, _very_ thin ice, but knows that if he repeats his mistake of filling in the void of discomfort with spite after what just happened, he might find himself responsible for a situation he can't put right.

So instead, he simply watches.

Watches as she gives her jeans a final tug up over slim hips.

Watches as she seems momentarily unsteady on her feet.

His gaze drifts from Cameron to the bottles on the table in which they'd indulged after quite a few more before ending up in her apartment. Brow furrowing, the slimy and unsavoury thought slithers into his mind of whether or not she would have invited him home or gone along with any of this had she been sober. He-

"-There's a difference between being a little tipsy and stumbling and lacking the awareness or the ability to make my own decisions."

The blonde interrupts his troubled thoughts, and he looks up at her sharply, holding her gaze as she gestures pointedly at the bottles on the table.

"You were frowning."

She informs him, and he nods as he takes in the defensive way she crosses her arms tightly around herself and clenches her jaw.

"I often am."

"No. Usually you look vexed or smug."

"Flatterer."

"You looked concerned."

"How awful. How will you _ever_ forgive me?"

He bites back gruffly, but the blonde's jaw remains clenched and her stance remains rigid and uncomfortable. He realises with belated amusement that he sits entirely naked but for his socks as she stares down at him with an unreadable expression, and he reaches down to grab his shirt and pull it over his lap. He watches her intently as he does so- watches her mouth for any sign of a smirk- but her demeanour doesn't change and he begins to feel that old, familiar itch to beat her down so as not to deal with his confusion when they share a room.

He sorely wishes he'd driven here, drunk or not.

That way he'd have an escape.

An out.

"I wanted to do that."

Cameron states quietly, and he is able to ascertain more from the tone of her voice than the woodenness of her posture that she feels just as lost following their recent foray into unknown territory as he does. His eyes remain fixed on hers as he shakes his head, wondering for the thousandth time what she sees in him.

"...There are many things that women do that men find notoriously perplexing. One of those is saying one thing, and meaning something entirely different. I would have to attest that this isn't true when it comes to you, and it rarely has been. You say preceisly what you mean to say and mean others to understand... _Ironically_ , this makes you the most perplexing woman I know."

"...Forgive me if I fail to see the humour in that."

"There was none implied. It was just an observation."

"Right."

Cameron replies in a small voice, before turning on her heel and walking stiffly to the door of her bedroom. House watches her go with a frown, unsure where they go from here. He almost calls out to ask her, but she pauses as she gets to the door, her fingers resisting on the handle, and speaks quietly without looking back at him.

"Pull out the sofa if you want. There's a cab company card pinned to the fridge... They're open from 5.30am."

Silence. She supposes she'd expected little else, but she can feel him looking at her. Can feel him watching her, and for the first time in a couple of years, she feels a strong wave of hatred towards him. It vanishes as swiftly as it appeared, and she is left feeling hurt and exhausted. These are emotions she is far more familiar with when it comes to House, but when she offers him some quiet parting words, her tone is laced with a bitter note of resentment the older doctor finds uncomfortably foreign.

"Generally, when two people who know and respect each other have sex, what they take away from that experience isn't that they find the other person 'perplexing'. Certainly, it's not the _only_ thought they'd have to share about the matter."


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Enjoy :) I promise the storyline will become apparent soon :p Reviews would be lovely!

Tossing over onto his back, House sighs as he contemplates the ceiling of Cameron's living room. He had eventually pulled out her spare bed after his initial attempts to lie across the sofa had been thwarted by his height; his leg cramping horribly, and his feet dangling over the armrest. He imagines that the blonde might be able to curl up where he could not quite nicely, but as soon as this mental image tiptoes into his mind he banishes it angrily.

Now, he simply waits.

Waits for the luminous red digits on her microwave to say 5:30am so that he can call the cab company she'd mentioned and get the hell out of Dodge.

He swallows, understanding that it might not be quite that simple. Cameron isn't just some hooker he can wash from his memory or duck past the next time he runs into her at a regular haunt. She works in the same building as he does, and as much as it sometimes vexes him, they still run very much in the same circles.

_Well, you could fire Foreman, hound Chase out... Start afresh as you meant to..._

This thought carries some appeal, but he knows that it's not going to solve anything, and the idea of having to replace Foreman for some other pretentious twerp just gives him a headache. He also knows that just as the blonde has never managed to cut ties with him, he is unable to just write her out of his life like that.

_What you did was stupid._

Yes, it probably was. Last night is probably high up on the list of stupid things that he's done- _and it's a long list!_ \- but he knows deep down that he wouldn't change anything. Wouldn't change the fact that he'd asked her to accompany him to the bar for a drink, nor that he chased her down into the changing rooms to hash out their spat in the labs. The only thing he would _change_ is how he'd reacted towards her once their breathing had returned to normal and she'd sat regarding him nervously while still sat gloriously naked on his lap. He had felt her eyes on him just as he had felt her stiffen up as ecstasy had been replaced by tension. He wishes now that he'd at least looked at her, but he doesn't know what she'd have wanted him to say.

_Evidently not that you found her "perplexing"._

No, she'd made that fairly clear when bidding him goodnight, and his brow creases as he has no idea why in the hell he decided to voice _that_ thought out of the thousands swimming in his mind at the time. He has no idea why he hadn't at least _cushioned_ it by reminding her that this is one of his favorite things about her, and that he loves her for it.

_What?_

_No._

No, that wording is grossly skewed... But he _does_ find himself itching to solve each new puzzle she throws his way with her curious behaviour, and he wonders if she knows just how amusing he finds this given how seemingly anal and sensible she portrays herself to be.

_"What? I can't have dirty thoughts because I'm a woman?"_

_"No, you can't have dirty thoughts because you're_ you _."_

_"Oh dear. This is going to be very educational for you."_

He squeazes his eyes shut with a groan, but it does nothing to stop the image of her pulling her sweater up over her head from burning into his brain. Slinging his arm over his face as he grinds his teeth, he finally pushes himself up and gives up trying to sleep. The bloody figures on the microwave read 4:57am and he rubs at his scruff as he studies them with a frown.

_Bloody figures._

_Blood._

_Blood in the bath._

The wound to her side had looked neat and in the process of healing, but the memory of the gore slathering her tub is one he doubts he will forget anytime soon.

Swallowing, he swings his legs down onto the soft brush of the rug that stretches between the sofa and the coffee table he has moved to one side, and he throws a glance over at his cane in the corner before limping towards the kitchen and getting himself a glass of water. Her cupboards are just as he'd imagined they'd be- their orderliness something he had missed when helping her cook before as he'd been rather distracted- and he grins as he inspects a row of glasses stacked carefully in size order, above a shelf of dry goods organised in much the same way. Everything has been neatly put in place with the label facing outwards, and any opened bags have been clipped shut with plain, matching wooden pegs.

"Cameron."

He muses with a smirk, before closing her regimented milita back into darkness and pouring the rest of his water down the sink. He stands leant over her counter, eyeing a small selection of framed photographs on the windowsill. He notes curiously that none of the pictures are of Cameron herself, save for one faded image of a couple of kids- one dark, one fair- that might be of the blonde when she'd been around four or five. He only assumes this due to the obvious age of the photo itself, and never having heard Cameron talk about any nieces, nephews or godchildren that she might care for enough to have out on display.

_Well, until recently, you didn't even know her brother's name..._

True. Very true. But he is fairly certain the picture is of Cameron and Dominic; the young boy pulling a face- dark eyes squinted and tongue poking out- and the girl looking away from the camera, unsmiling. It strikes him that if the image _is_ of the blonde and her brother, it is an odd choice given that neither of them seem all that thrilled about their picture being taken, and he wonders if it has simply been picked due to there being only a limited number of options.

_Stop. Stop this. Stop trying to figure her out._

He can't help it, though. It's what he does, and despite being unsure where they currently stand as he knows he has hurt her with his actions- of lack thereof- before the young doctor stalked off, she remains one of his favoured specimens to dissect.

Beside the two kids, there's a photo of a young man who looks to be in his early twenties, although there is an unhealthy gauntness to his face. Beside him is another man with a much brighter complexion and crooked grin, and House raises a brow as he studies the two shrewdly; sure that they are Cameron's late husband and his friend.

The one the blonde had considered cheating with.

_A bizarre choice or a stern reminder?_

Glancing back at her closed bedroom door, House frowns and shakes his head. He has no interest in the other two pictures which are both of inane landscapes that look to have been taken somewhere other than New Jersey, and he limps over to her fridge to pull down the card for the cab company and beings counting down.

_7 minutes 18 seconds._

* * *

"Hey! Hey, wait up!"

Foreman calls, jogging down the hall until he catches up with Cameron who turns around to study him quizzically.

"Are you alright?"

She asks, looking down at the clipboard in his hands which appears to have a lot more red ink glaring out from it than usual.

"Been better. So have _you_ by the looks of things."

Foreman grunts as he rifles through the papers to find the one he wants. He finally looks back up to find green eyes regarding him warily, and he asks her if he's wrong.

"I'm alright... Just didn't get much sleep."

The blonde confides woodenly, and Foreman frowns as now that he properly _looks_ at her he'd say she looks distressed rather than tired; her eyes slightly pink and her stance tight and uncomfortable. He doesn't have time to try and coax more of a response from her though, and so he offers her a commiserating smile before getting down to business.

"I need you to look at these test results we got for our patient."

"Look, I glanced at the notes for your _last_ patient as a request, and it... It didn't work in my favour. I don't want to sound like a bitch, but I don't think this should become a regular thing... I have my own cases down in the ER."

"I know that, but it's not me that's asking."

"... Who is it then?"

Cameron asks slowly, her breath catching in her throat as she wonders if House has requested her to help out, yet refusing to believe it. She tells herself that her heart skips with dread rather than anything else, anything idiotic, and raises her brow in request for an explanation. Before Foreman can give it to her, they are interrupted by a sharp bark from down the hall as the steady clicks of the Dean's heels accompany her approach.

"Oh good, you're here. You two, my office, please. I'll be there shortly."

Cuddy greets them, before stalking past on her way to the elevators. Cameron looks back at Foreman in surprise as he gestures towards the Dean and then back at the papers in his hands.

"Cuddy requested you take a look, or I wouldn't have asked... Chase told me House gave you a hard time after you checked the lab results before."

He sighs as they begin making their way for the stairs that lead to the Dean's office.

"Yeah... Does House _know_ about this?"

The blonde asks, her stomach dropping as they make their ascent.

"Not yet."


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Sorry for the wait, I have been working mostly on my own/ non fanfic story as I have a deadline of Oct 23rd. Hopefully once that's done, this will be updated more regularly- and the direction it's taking will become clear :) Reviews would be awesome :)

"Take a seat, you two."

Cuddy instructs as she slips behind her desk and sorts through the papers littering its surface distractedly. Cameron and Foreman do as she says, taking up a perch on the sofa at the back of the room, leaving the chair opposite the Dean's own vacant for House. Foreman casts his attention back down at the files in his hands, and Cameron supposes she would ordinarily have scooched up next to him by now to read over his shoulder, but she's having trouble finding the will to commit herself to the looming prospect of collaborative work with House and his team.

One glance at Cuddy lets her know that the decision isn't going to be hers to make. This meeting is merely a formality.

The blonde clasps her hands together in her lap and waits; curiously reminded of when she'd come in for her first interview with the Dean. That too had merely been a formality. It had been House that had hired her and House that had laced his first meeting with her with a whole circus of hoops to jump through and traps to fall into. She'd been determined back then, and his blatant attempt to antagonise her had lit a fire he would spend the next three years working slowly to stamp out; always leaving at least one last ember smouldering so that it wouldn't die out completely. For a long time, she'd seen this as an act of carefully veiled kindness.

She wonders now if it hadn't in fact been a method of sadistic torture.

House's last move after telling her the job was hers if she wanted it had been to tell her she was to go and see Cuddy to finalise her offer. He had made a point of mentioning to her something she had already picked up on in medical school; women in power do not always look too fondly upon other women with ambition for power. She is sure now that he'd done so to psyche her out, to see if she'd falter, but she'd been more defiant back then. Less exhausted. As it turned out, there _was_ no final interview, and Cuddy had looked up at her when she'd knocked on the door with a frown of incomprehension. Still, the Dean had asked her to take a seat and had asked her a few questions about her previous experiences and what she was looking to gain from accepting the position. She had done so curtly- formally- but pleasantly.

What she _hadn't_ done was warn her about House.

_You wouldn't have listened..._

No, she supposes she wouldn't have. At the time due to simple ambition, but as things progressed and the warning signs had made themselves known, she'd already been in too deep.

"How are you feeling, Allison?"

Cuddy shakes the blonde from her thoughts, and Cameron glances over at the darker woman who remains engrossed in her paperwork. She still finds it odd to hear her first name used by most of her colleagues, but after several discussions concerning her relocation to the ER and taking up the position of head attending, she'd at some point stopped being Cameron to Cuddy and become Allison. In turn she had called the brunette Lisa just once, but it had felt wrong to her and she'd gone back to Dr Cuddy immediately.

"Okay..."

Cameron replies hesitantly, the Dean's enquiry putting her mind into overdrive before it occurs to her that she hasn't spoken directly with Cuddy since everything went down with her scalpel wielding friend.

"I'm fine, it's only really sore now if I stretch, and with the student nurses around I don't have to do much of that."

She elaborates more freely, until the memory of pulling her sweater up over her head last night while sat splayed across House's lap comes to mind and she swiftly shuts up.

As if on cue, the door gets pushed open with no warning knock and House limps into the office with a frown.

"You summoned me?"

He greets the Dean accusingly, and Cuddy looks up and gestures towards the empty chair.

"Take a seat and we'll get started now that you're all here."

She requests as she moves the papers on her desk into a neat stack. House turns around to spy who else might be part of the meeting, and as his eyes meet Cameron's they flash first with discomfort and then with ice.

"What's she doing here?"

He turns to demand of the Dean, and Cuddy raises a brow but isn't wholly surprised at the greying doctor's lack of tact. Addressing the each of the others rather than just House's irritable question, she sits back in her chair with a sigh.

"I asked Dr Foreman to bring Dr Cameron along to this meeting as I have a temporary request to make of her. Ordinarily, I wouldn't do this, Allison, but this is a rather unique situation. We have now lost two patients in quick succession without gaining an understanding of what might be the cause of their symptoms. The police have been notified and I think the general consensus from all accounts is that foul play is involved, but the _who_ and the _why_ is their jurisdiction. What _we_ need to provide them with is the _how_. There's something going on, and something that's stopping these girls' bodies from fighting off whatever's been done or given to them. We received a third victim- another anonymous drop off- about an hour ago, and from Dr Foreman's preliminary examination, it looks like the same series of events is about to be set in motion. I don't want another body to present to the police, I want answers. Cameron, I appreciate you made the decision to change positions, but that doesn't change the fact that this is your specialty. Until this whole mess has been cleared up, you're back on the team. I will talk to Mathilde about covering your absence in the ER, but this case gets your full attention until it's been solved. Any objections?"

The brunette asks, although her expression doesn't allow for any answer apart from affirmative, and so Cameron simply nods woodenly, feeling a little sick. She is unsurprised when House speaks up.

"I _have_ a team, I don't need another idiot to babysit. I have a perfectly cohesive group of specialists upstairs, all of whom have _chosen_ to be there and have a lot more to offer than any Head Attending could. I have committed and dedicated doctors working on this case that don't need the distraction of someone coming in and sticking their nose where it isn't needed."

Cameron swallows, looking from House to Cuddy nervously as Foreman clears his throat beside her uncomfortably. The Dean appears unmoved by House's words, and she replies with an air of finality

"Don't call your colleagues 'idiots', House, I don't have room in this month's budget should Dr Cameron decide to file a complaint against you."

"As if _she'd_ ever have the guts to-"

"-Enough. As much as I am _thrilled_ that you seem suddenly so in favour and commending of your team, you know as well as I do that Cameron will be an asset to you in this case. Please try to refrain from informing her otherwise. You will allow her to assist you, and you will do so gratefully, or at least within earshot of _myself_ that will be the case. Cameron, I appreciate this turn of events may not be to your liking, but I'm afraid for the time being, I'm unable to put your needs before getting down to the bottom of what's going on here. I hope that _you_ at least will respect this fact with grace."

"...I'll talk Mathilde through the changes we made to procedure for triage and she should be able to take over from there."

Cameron sighs, accepting her fate.

House glowers at the Dean from his seat, warning irritably

"Do you _really_ think we're going to find the answer to the puzzle when my team is preoccupied with the fact that they don't want her there."

"Foreman, do _you_ object to Cameron's help?"

Cuddy sighs wearily, glancing over at her computer and opening up a new email that has just come in; no longer invested in trying to make peace where she knows it will do her no good.

"Of course not."

Foreman replies immediately, looking away as he can feel House's gaze piercing into him accusingly.

"Well then-"

"-It's not _Foreman's_ decision. It's not his team."

"No, you're right, it's _my_ decision."

Cuddy snaps back irritably, before looking up and assessing all three of them. Turning her attention back to House, she finishes firmly

"And for the duration of this case, it's _his_ team. I trust that you will behave accordingly."

Silence meets this revelation as each of them knows full well that there is no chance of this happening.


	26. Chapter 26

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: More storyline coming soon, but I do like writing the little exchanges like this too, and hope they will add to the overall story :) Reviews would be awesome! Thanks for reading :)

Finally, when it becomes clear that Cuddy considers the case to be closed, House pushes himself up and limps from the room without a word or look cast at his colleagues that remain sat stiffly on the sofa. The door hisses as it swings shut behind him, and the Dean looks back up from her computer and sighs.

"I know this isn't the easiest position for either of you to be in, but as long as I am running this hospital, lives come first. Generally that means this lives of the patients before the hang ups of my staff... But don't think I'm not aware I'm asking a lot of you. Foreman, you have my go ahead to do what you feel needs doing unless the cost exceeds your budget, after which I expect you to come to me for approval. Cameron... I know House will test you, but if you could refrain from putting in a complaint, I-"

"-I know what I'm getting into. I'm not going to do that."

The blonde sighs, feeling both weak and angry at vocally admitting to this fact after House had challenged her on her ability to do so, but the look Cuddy gives her is one of understanding and exhaustion, and Cameron knows deep down that the request that she not complicate matters is a personal one rather than a professional one. However, right now, she's unsure whether this knowledge provides her with compassion or rage.

_He's always liked you, even when he acts up, he takes you into consideration. Maybe I'm jealous of that. Not of you, not of his relationship with you, but the fact that he respects you. I would like to know what that feels like._

She sighs, accepting Cuddy's grateful nod with a tight smile. She thinks back on the conversation had with House while sitting on the floor of the woman's locker rooms and how hopeful she'd been that things had changed. How happy she'd been to grasp at the positive attention she'd been given, and how easily she'd convinced herself it spoke of things progressing between them. She'd been so sure of it; from his helping her in the ER and patching her up, to his visit to check up on her and helping her with dinner. It had all seemed like such a huge step, and the worst thing about all this is that she _had_ been cautious. She hadn't been foolish about it or quick to jump in head first. The progression had seemed natural, and had hinged on the fact that House had seemed to understand and _regret_ some of his previous behaviour.

That's what hurts now.

The fact that he hadn't even been able to look at her.

The fact that he's pushing her away now, as though done with her in more ways than one.

"Come on, let's go pick up a coffee and head over to the DDX room, I'll page the others."

Foreman sighs, giving her a light prod in the thigh, and she nods, fingering the pink folds of her scrubs before pushing herself up.

"I'll change, too. I only have jeans with me, but that's better than these."

She glances back at Cuddy who nods permissively without looking up, before following Foreman out the room. They get about halfway down the hallway before he comes to a stop and turns to face her.

"What _was_ that?"

"What was what?"

"House. Why was he being that way with you?"

"Was it any different to how he _usually_ is with me?"

She sighs, and Foreman nods with his brow furrowed.

"He teases you in hopes of getting a reaction. This wasn't teasing..."

"Good, you noticed that too."

"Cam, I'm serious, what's going on? If I'm in charge, I need to know."

"You're _not_ in charge."

The blonde shakes her head, setting off down the hall with Foreman hurrying behind in her wake and demanding irritably

"Yes, I am. You just heard Cuddy specify that-"

"-Oh, you're in charge on paper, sure, but you know that's not how this all works. It's _House's_ team, _he's_ in charge, he'll _always_ be in charge. The others will do what he says over you."

"You don't think I command respect?"

"I think that whenever the opportunity comes along to take the lead you can become an arrogant prick, but I _do_ respect you, and I'm sure they do too."

"Just not as much as they respect House?"

"Possibly not. You respect the sea more so than a lake, because the sea can provide you with more fish, but it can also turn on you without warning. You're by the book, and that's good, but I'd do what the criminal said before the cop because I don't want to get shot in the head."

"Spoken like a true white girl."

Foreman grumbles, and Cameron sighs as she stops walking and turns to face him.

"Are you pissed at me for telling you what you don't want to hear?"

"I'm pissed that it's not even nine in the morning and you're spewing stupid analogies at me."

"And because you know I'm _right."_

The blonde pushes, and Foreman glowers at her before offering a twitch of his mouth.

"Possibly. I'm not foreseeing this being much fun."

"That's probably wise... And I didn't mean the others- and myself- wouldn't do what you asked. I just meant that House is going to push back, and he knows the easiest way to do that is to toy with your team rather than you directly."

"I guess you're right... You were always the best at reading him."

"... I thought that too, but I'm not so sure."

Cameron muses hollowly, taking a couple of steps so that she stands with her hand rested on the door to the locker room. Foreman moves to lean against the wall opposite- silently communicating that he means to wait for her- and speaks up in a kinder tone.

"Allie... _Is_ everything alright between you two?"

"... Everything is exactly how it's always been. Nothing's changed."

The blonde replies without looking back, before disappearing from view.

* * *

Inside the locker room, Cameron changes into her jeans and a sweater; the same one House had noticed back in the ER staff room with the zip detail down the back. The one cut low at the front. She looks down at herself before assessing her reflection in the mirror, wishing she'd brought something else with her, but rarely needing a change of clothes these days as the access to scrubs is endless. As she stands tying her hair back with a wince and slight bend to her side to ease strain from her hip, she spies Nancy and one of the student nurses come hurrying in and nods in acknowledgement.

"Mathilde says she's covering for you."

Nancy greets her, almost accusingly, and the blonde eyes her pink scrubs longingly and nods.

"For the time being. Cuddy asked me to work an on-going case with Diagnostics."

"You're not moving back, are you?"

"Of course not. I'm just helping out."

"Promise? You're not going to let them persuade you to stay there?"

"I don't think that's likely to happen."

"No?"

"No. They don't want me there."

Cameron sighs, straightening up and pulling her sweater into place. Nancy chuckles and gives her a pat on the arm, mocking 'aww' into her ear before heading to her locker, and the blonde smiles thinly.

_It's true, though, and I'm under no illusion that they're going to refrain from letting me know it._

"I'll see you later."

She advises through gritted teeth, watching Nancy raise a hand cheerily, midway through pulling her shirt off over her head. Exiting the locker room, Foreman regards her amiably, standing with his hands in his pockets and his clip board nestled against his side.

"Ready?"

"No."

"Coming?"

"Yes."


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Happy new year :) Sorry for the wait, but, new year- new schedule, which has been set up to get these chapters done in the mornings before work. (Well, that's the plan!). I hope you enjoy! sorry for all the drama, but let's face it, House can be a contrary ass at times... hopefully, that's soon to be resolved...
> 
> Reviews would be lovely :)

As they enter the DDX room, Cameron keeps her head held high despite her urge to look at the floor. She keeps her eyes trained carefully to the whiteboard- trying to ignore the overwhelming wave of nostalgia this simple sight brings that causes her stomach to flip nauseatingly- so as to avoid looking at any of her temporary colleagues directly. She can feel them looking at _her_ though, as she forgoes the empty seat at the head of the table where she imagines Foreman means to sit, and pulls out one of the two chairs stacked in the corner. In doing so, she has unwittingly placed herself between House and Taub, and she swiftly drags the chair around so that she sits in the corner beside Thirteen. Offering Hadley a tight smile as she takes her seat, she breathes a small sigh of relief when _this_ at least goes reciprocated, even if only in a businesslike fashion.

 _Why couldn't Cuddy have asked for both me_ and _Chase to come help out, at least then I'd have some backup..._

True, but she's wary of what comments House might spew her way after their hook up last night, and while she doesn't relish enduring them in front of her current team, she _definitely_ doesn't wish to add arguing with Chase to her list of shit to do today. They're in a good place at the moment, but the blond carries strong streaks of both possessiveness and 'I told you so', neither of which she's in a mood to discuss.

_Maybe it won't be that bad, maybe-_

"-Well now that the boss and his secretary have _finally_ graced us with their presence, perhaps we can begin?"

House growls from down the table; his chair tipped onto its back legs as he bounces his cane against the carpet in a series of light, repetitive thuds.

Foreman glowers at him.

Cameron simply looks away.

"Don't start."

Foreman warns, and crystal blues pierce back at him cooly.

"Or I'll get into trouble? Is that it, Boss-Man?"

"House, can we just make a start?"

"We can, but I'm distracted. Dr Cameron's distracting me, and that hardly seems fair."

"She's not _doing_ anything!"

Foreman replies irritably, shuffling through his papers before getting up and grabbing a marker from the shelf below the whiteboard.

"It's not what she's _doing_ , it's what she's _wearing_."

House continues as though his colleague has said nothing, and the blonde glances over at him uncertainly, aware that both Taub and Kutner study her with their brows furrowed; searching for the punchline.

"House-"

"-I have full view of her clavicles! I'm even getting a good slice of sternum! How are we supposed to work if she's not going to play by her usual rules of dressing like a five year old going to etiquette school."

A titter at this from Hadley, although she quickly modifies her expression to cool apathy when Cameron shoots her a narrow-eyed glance. Kutner rubs at his scruff uncomfortably, while House waits- wide eyed- for Foreman to play his game. His wish is denied when the neurologist holds up his hand in a silent request that they end their bickering once and for all, and he continues with the task at hand; going through the most recent findings in their new patient's blood and urine samples. Once done, he sends most of the team down to the labs to rerun tests showing anomalies, but keeps House and Cameron behind. As the door closes behind Taub, he turns to them and leans over the desk; palms braced and brow speaking of thunder.

"Okay, I don't know _what's_ going on with you two, but I'm not having it. Do you _know_ who's had to make the last two death notifications?! Me. I'm not doing that again!"

"Calm down, it was only to the police, not any family members."

House points out disinterestedly, and Foreman raises a hand as he snaps back angrily

"It still makes me look like an _idiot_!"

"Oh, so, it's not that you _care_ about the girls that are dropping like flies, this is all about _ego_... I was wrong. Maybe we do need Cameron after all. Her bleeding heart might make up for your lack of one. Together, you two might even make a tolerable package."

"This isn't the _time_ for any of this..."

The blonde interjects in a low voice, and Foreman nods his agreement while House pulls back mockingly and warns

"We better do as she says; she sounds _predictably_ serious."

"I am," Cameron bites back, unable to help herself from hissing "and you wouldn't know the right time for something if it hit you in the _face_."

Before pushing herself up from the desk and storming off. House and Foreman exchange a glance, but it doesn't even occur to the latter to question the blonde's meaning. After all, he's in full agreement with her statement.

House, however, feels an unusually potent pang of guilt as he watches the door swing shut. He knows he's riding Cameron something rotten, and worse; he knows she doesn't deserve it. He feels bad for calling her out on what she'd been wearing, and angry at his team for expressing- most likely _nervous_ \- amusement in response. It had been unprofessional for him to do so, which he isn't all that concerned about, but it had also been cruel. At the _time,_ though... Well, at the time he'd been thrown seeing the blonde sat here, in _his_ territory, wearing that _goddamn_ sweater. After all, he is used to working across from her and finding her attractive; he'd spent three years doing so, but rarely would the first thought that came to mind when working with her be one of _arousal_. He's not sure whether the cause for this newfound dilemna had been the tension in the room (he does so _love_ the underdog), or the fact that he has finally tasted the forbidden fruit.

 _You're unclear where your head's at and it makes you mean. She should_ know _that by now..._

Yes, she should, but she shouldn't have to be called up on it in front of the others, especially when she's already the outsider.

"And now she's even _angrier_."

He mutters beneath his breath, while knowing that anger is only _part_ of what the blonde will be feeling and welcoming back that old, familiar house guest: self loathing.

 _Done it again. Hurt her_ again _. I could argue that I've warned her, but this wasn't even part of any game she chose to play. She_ didn't _opt to trust a snarling dog only to get bitten; she tried to keep as far out of its way as possible and it jumped over the fence and savaged her._

"House!"

Foreman barks loudly, and when the greying doctor looks up at him, he would guess that his old protégée has said his name several times already.

"What, boss?"

He asks, twisting his finger pointedly in his ear, feigning deafness.

"I said go and check down at the desk if the patient had anything else on her apart from the jacket they gave us. One of the nurses mentioned a bag."

"Grunt work?"

House asks, disgusted, and Foreman sighs as he turns his back to his mentor and studies the board. Speaking up without looking around, he suggests cooly

"Remember who's in charge? Either go and do what I asked, or find Cameron and apologise. Your call."

"Since when do _you_ care about office relationships?"

"Since you crossed the line between being a jerk and being a bully. Me, I can take _either_ option, but Allison can't."

"Then your issue _should_ be with _her_."

"No. It's with you. Cameron's a good doctor and could actually _help_ us here, House, but if you keep on at her the way you have been, she's not going to be thinking straight."

"Well, she _is_ obsessed with me..."

House agrees, and Foreman snorts derisively and shakes his head.

"No. That's _you_. _You're_ the one hung up on you... _She's_ moved on, House. She's said so plenty of times."

"And I've heard _Wilson_ tell _each_ of his wives they're the one, that doesn't make it _true_."

"... Just go and make an apology- a formal, _professional_ apology- or ask one of the desk girls to help you gather and catalogue my patient's things."

Foreman sighs, and he places a private bet as he hears the door open and close behind him that House will pick the second option.

_That, or find a quiet place to watch General Hospital._

* * *

"Hey."

"Hey..."

Cameron tenses and replies guardedly as she keeps her gaze cast down the lens of the microscope, under which once healthy platelets appear dead and destroyed.

"Look... About just now. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to laugh like that."

Hadley states uncomfortably from the doorway to the lab, and the blonde sighs as she makes a small annotation on the file to her right and assures

"It's fine. House had a point."

There's bitterness in Cameron's tone, but Thirteen cautiously decides that it's not directed towards her, and she muses lightly

"About etiquette school, or distracting clavicles?"

"I don't know..."

The blonde replies a little less tersely, straightening up and turning around to face the woman so often referred to as her replacement. Looking down at herself, she shrugs and proposes cooly

"You tell me."

"I prefer the sweater to the shirts, and you do have nice clavicles. I'm also not interested in you... If the others have told you anything to now give you cause for concern."

"I wasn't concerned... While we're clearing stuff up though, I'm not _jealous_ of you... That's something _you_ might have heard or wondered about..."

"I've heard it."

"From House?"

"From Taub."

"Really?... He doesn't even _know_ me."

The blonde frowns.

"No. I know. I did wonder a little for myself because of a few things I'd picked up on, but I took no notice of _him_ for that very reason."

"He doesn't like me much, does he?"

Cameron sighs, and Hadley shrugs but doesn't deny this fact.

"You're not his type."

"Well, I-"

"-He's a plastic surgeon; women either find that impressive or inwardly repulsive, and I think plastics can sniff out which type you are... He doesn't like _me_ all too much, either."

"You find your close colleague repulsive?"

"Well, I don't find him _impressive_. That's enough to blacken my name a little."

"I guess I could see that... Just know that he's wrong; I'm not jealous."

"After what just happened in that meeting, I believe you."

"Yeah, well, I-"

"-Cameron. Do you need an adult?"

A gruff voice interrupts, and the two women turn to spy House wiggling his eyebrows suggestively as he looks from the blonde to the brunette.

"Hadley likes my clavicles and my sweater, nothing more."

Cameron replies breezily, but House knows her well, and he can detect the ice that underlines her tone as she regards him coldly and it feels as though she's stabbed him with a shard of it.

"What have I _told_ you about spoiling my fantasies!?"

He groans dutifully, to which he receives a withering look from Thirteen and no discernible emotion at all from the blonde. Dropping his usual schtick, he points a finger almost accusingly at Cameron and instructs

"You need to come with me."

"Why?"

"Just _do_ it. Why are you making this hard? You're supposed to be the _obedient_ one..."

"I'm _supposed_ to be checking over the new blood work."

Cameron disagrees, but when House makes no move to leave her to it, she sighs and hands the paperwork on the counter over to Hadley.

"Deterioration is increasing in speed when compared to the last patient. Check for any genetic or viral factors that could cause this, and I'll check the patient once I'm done."

With that, she stalks for the door; waiting for House to lead them out and to wherever he means to take her. Once out of earshot, while limping a little ahead of the blonde, the greying doctor muses

"I find it _fascinating_ when you take charge like that. I shouldn't, but it's like watching a puppy that's learnt how to juggle."

"I run a department."

Cameron points out caustically, and House sighs as he takes a left down the corridor.

"Why are we headed for Rheumatology?"

The blonde frowns, quickening her stride to keep up with the dull thunk of House's cane.

"We're not."

"Then where are we going?"

"The chapel."

" _Why_?"

"I'm feeling spiritual."

"House! What are we-"

"-Or maybe I'm just crazy. I don't know!"

He shrugs, and he pushes open the double doors lacquered in oak veneer to lead them into the small, dimly lit room.

They are alone, although someone must have stopped by not too long ago as a couple of candles flicker in the corner beneath a sign that simply reads 'prayers'. Reaching for one of the longer floor length candlesticks, House slots its metal base through both handles of the doors to shut them in.

" _House!_ You can't do _that_! What if-"

But Cameron bites her tongue with a small noise of surprise as House turns with unlikely speed to pin her against the wall. She frowns at him; utterly perplexed. She is perfectly able to move as he leans over her at arm's length, with his palms braced against the wall either side of her narrow shoulders; keeping her trapped only with his gaze. Yet, she refrains. She has no clue what he wants or why he's doing this, but of all the feelings she's ever had for her long ago mentor, _fear_ has never been high on the list.

 _Fear_ for _him, yes, but_ of _him?... No. Which is perhaps a mistake given his ability to cut deeper than any scalpel-wielding maniac might ever hope to accomplish._

"What?"

She asks simply after a long pause.

"We need to talk."

House replies gruffly, and she shakes her head; her expression hard.

"You didn't want to talk."

Ice. Resentment. Hurt.

He detects all this in spite of the blonde keeping her tone low and even.

"I know. I _still_ don't, but-"

"-Then move. Let me up and let me out... _One_ of us needs to do their fucking _job._ "

_Fucking. Fucking. Fucking._

He wishes she wouldn't use that word. It had once amused him, but now- even in anger- it ignites a very different feeling low down in his gut.

"No."

"What do you _mean_ , no? House! I mean it, I'm not in the mood for any of this crap, so just listen to me, and-"

"-No. _You_ listen to _me_! I said we need to talk."

"Fine... Then _talk._ "


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Oh dear, this is all getting very dramatic. I'd originally had something else/ more fun planned for this exchange but the more I went over it in my head, the more I just didn't think Cameron would be down with it given how things have been going between them the last couple of chapters. Fear not, though. This story is written with House X Cameron endgame in mind, and they will get to a better point with one another eventually. For now, I hope you at least enjoy some of the sentiment of the exchange, as it winds up towards a shift in the plot. Dun dun dun. Thanks for reading and please review :)

_"Fine... Then talk!"_

Cameron waits; mouth downturned as she meets House's gaze uneasily. Still, she makes no effort to move from the prison of his body, and as silence draws out between them, she becomes aware of the subtle scent of his shampoo. She recognises it as the type available in the hospital locker rooms; unobtrusive and unisex.

 _He showered when he got into work. Didn't even want to stick around long enough to do_ that _at mine... Didn't want anything to do with me after we..._

"It's not hard."

She interrupts that line of thought, shaking her head as she urges House to either speak or to leave her be. She's almost convinced that he means to say nothing despite his insistence in leading her here, but finally he argues gruffly

"It is. It's hard to know what to say to a woman so that she won't bite your head off. _Everyone_ knows that. Everyone knows how you guys can-"

"-No. This has nothing to do with that. This is about you and about me. Don't bring gender into it. I've _never_ bitten you, not once... I just wish you would return the favour."

"Well, if I'd known you weren't into that, I-"

"-House!"

"What? Is that not what you wanted to talk about? Isn't the whole _reason_ you're mad the lack of conversation last night?"

"I-"

"-What did you _want_ me to say? Did you want me to tell you it was _good_? That you're hot? That you're good in bed- well, proverbially? Because I can. I can tell you all of those things. If it matters that much to you to hear me say it, then fine, I'll feed you whatever you need to mend your ego. Truthfully, I hadn't pegged you as the type, but I'll give it a go-"

"-House-"

"-You want details? You felt good; on me, around me. You look better in the flesh than you ever have in my head, and that's a rarity. The noises you make are something else; they're real and they're fucking dangerous. How am I doing so far? Do you want more dirt? Do you want me to get down and nasty with it? Do you-"

"-No... No that's not what I want."

"What then? What would _you_ have wanted to happen last night? What do you want?"

"... You can't give me what I want."

The blonde shakes her head as she speaks softly; studying clear blue and deepening frown lines. She feels both exasperated and begrudgingly flustered by House's words, and as he waits for her to elaborate, she's crucially aware that it would require very little movement to kiss him. On top of all that- _shrouding_ all that- is a deep and weary sense of defeat, and as her gaze drops to the hard line of House's lips, she wets her own but makes no move to close the distance between them.

"What, then?"

House pushes, swallowing at the pink flicker of the blonde's tongue. His tone remains gruff, but his expression reveals a hint of wariness. He is unsure whether she means to answer him, and concerned that if she _does_ , she will tell him something he won't like. He imagines that this is inevitable- _typical_ , even- but as he waits for her to speak, he is troubled by a myriad of images that have complicated and muddied the way things work between them recently.

The look on her face when he'd squared up to her the first night he'd slept over at her apartment; a glimmer of uncertainty overridden by foolish, dog-loyal trust.

Her laughing; genuine and uninhibited. Allowing him that.

Mostly though; the blood in the bath. Red and terrible with a dreadful smear- four lines- so reminiscent of a handprint.

Gritting his teeth, House's attention drops momentarily to the soft wool covering the blonde's hip, before finding cool green once again. He wonders if she has decided to stay silent, and removes one of his palms from its dominant post beside her shoulder in favour of brushing several unruly strands of hair from her face with unlikely gentleness. He catches a tick at her jaw in response to this gesture, but she neither plays into him nor flinches away. Progressing tentatively, he finds her chin with his forefinger and thumb and keeps them there- pressed lightly against soft skin- before leaning in experimentally. He brushes his lips against hers for just a moment and then she stops him; turning her head to the side just a fraction, but it's enough for him to pull back and study her with a frown.

"You can't give me what I want."

She repeats, before injecting a little more aggression into her tone and calling him out.

"And I would think _that_ was a pretty bold move given what's just happened! Do you really think I'd want to _kiss_ you after the way you spoke to me in the DDX room? That's _your_ team, not mine, and you went for me in front of all of them, knowing full well what you were doing. That was unfair. Treating me the way you have been when I've been asked to _help_ you is unfair. Somehow even _moreso,_ because you weren't like that last night... You weren't like that at _all_ in the locker room."

"Do you want me to apologise? Is that it? Because I will. I may well start smoking, or melting, or whichever affliction your preferred depiction of evil endures, but I'll take that action. If you want me to apologise, then I will. I do."

"That's not what I want. I appreciate it, and I accept it, but it's not enough."

"Cameron, you-"

"-I just want to _matter_ to you. That's all. I'm not asking you to love me. I'm not asking you to do anything huge or momentous. All I've _ever_ wanted is to matter to you, and you can't give me that. You can give me false hope that one day I _might_ , but I'm sick of falling for it. I'm sick of trying to decipher mixed signals that compel me to hold out hope. It's _exhausting_. Sometimes you do things that make it so hard...You keep me around. You check up on me. You refrain from crushing me completely and you let me think that you're doing it out of kindness, but sometimes I'm not so sure. Sometimes I just think that if you crushed me completely, you'd lose one of your toys, and that's the _real_ reason why you don't it.

After our talk in the locker rooms, I felt as though something had changed, I _really_ did... But you don't treat someone the way you treat me if they matter to you. Today in Cuddy's office, in the DDX room, last night... You _hurt_ me, and it's not because I'm weak or naive or lovestruck. It's because what you do is _cruel_. What you do is calculated. You _know_ what it is that you're doing, and you do it anyway... You've accused me so many times of being desperate for you to love me in return, but that's not what any of this is about. Last night wasn't about _love_! Despite what you often say about me, neither one of us is that _blind_ that we'd start throwing that word around... It was sex. It was something I'd wanted from you for a long time, and I'd made no secret of that. It was sex, and it was good. _You_ were good. You were what I wanted... But the way you treated me afterwards... That stung. I've always been your biggest supporter when it comes to giving you a million excuses for why you do the things you do, but you know what? Do you know what I was thinking lying in bed last night?... It was just _selfish_. It was _mean_. It wasn't 'typical House', because the situation was _a_ typical. The whole _evening_ was atypical. _I_ didn't really know what to do after we'd finished either, and I think that's fair. It's fine. You not knowing what to do or say was totally understandable... But I would have taken _anything_... I was hurt and angry and you _knew_ that. It was a tense and horrible situation; to have done something you can't take back. Something you've wanted for a long time but had known might come with a risk. I was upset, and maybe that angered you, or you found it terribly predictable, I don't _know_... But I don't get why you feel the need to _continue_ twisting the knife... I don't get _why_ I deserved the crap you gave me in front of the others; why was that the _answer_ in your mind?! You were kind to me in the locker rooms, and awful towards me this morning, and just now you tried to _kiss_ me! You ask me what I want from you, but I could ask _you_ the same thing! You're both good to me and terrible to me, but none of how that makes _me_ feel matters to you. _I_ don't matter to you. If I did, you wouldn't do it.

I've told you countless times I don't expect you to _love_ me, and while it isn't always easy to accept it's unlikely to ever happen, it's still true. I don't _expect_ it. You told me you _liked_ me though, and I was elated. Pathetically elated, maybe, at least I'm sure you would say so... But it's not enough."

The blonde's voice hitches with this last statement, but she takes care to otherwise keep her composure. She's afraid that House will ask her what they do now- how they move on- as she doesn't have an answer. She tries to read from his expression how her angry admission has been received, but he regards her with that same, disengaged look favoured the previous evening and she nips the tip of her tongue as she fears she's on the verge of tears whether she wants to be or not, and she has no wish for an audience.

"It's not enough for me."

She repeats quietly, and House struggles to find a response. He knows that he owes her one, but nothing comes forth in his mind save for images of her bathroom.

Her blood-streaked bath.

_You do matter to me... You must do. I was afraid. I was worried about you..._

It should be easy.

It should be easy to tell her at least this much. It might not cover everything- make up for _everything_ \- that she's said, but it's a start.

 _She knows, though. You as good as told her. Your actions_ showed _you care about her, so what_ more _does she want? ...This is what you_ knew _would happen. You called it._

And a part of him knows that's not fair, but his head hurts, his leg hurts, his ego hurts. He hates everything she's told him and he hates that he can still see her; straddling him with that surprising air of confidence that had vanished all too soon once their ecstasy was over. Leaning over her- close enough to kiss, close enough to bite- he can smell her shampoo and her body lotion. He can feel the heat of her- the reality of her- and hear the soft flutter of her breathing.

"I warned you this would happen. I warned you that your feelings would get in the way."

Blood.

Blood red.

Blood red on white- white bath, smeared scarlet.

Stitches.

Stitches above green lace.

Blood.

It had blossomed wild up the side of her scrubs, just as it blooms now at her cheeks, and she's angry. She doesn't say so- doesn't move- but he can tell she's furious with him, and he supposes that's only fair. He doesn't know why he said what he did. He doesn't know why it hurts to look at her.

_Why? Why couldn't I just have told her about the bath?_

He opens his mouth to try and do so- to try and take back his words as he so often wishes he could when dealing with Cameron- but she shuts him down with a low exhalation of breath and a cold refusal.

"Don't you _dare_... This has _nothing_ to do with me. I'm not the one with the _problem_ here! There is a _world_ of difference between my feelings _for_ you and my feelings in _general_. You used to spare me at least _some_ of the latter... But don't you fucking dare act like I'm upset because you're not returning my calls, or rushing to walk me down the aisle, or any of the other pathetic _crap_ you're so sure I'm likely to suffer from. _You_ make me suffer. _You_. I'm upset because the minute you got yours, you went back to treating me like _shit_. You didn't even wait for me to get off your _lap_... You called me pretty, you told me you liked me, we've known each other for years and there _should_ be a level of respect between us. You've even implied so yourself several times in the past, and then you _still_ go and-... I... House, since what happened to me in the ER, you haven't made my life easy; you've been crappy towards me now and then with no warning or _reason,_ but mostly you've been nice. Mostly you've been behaving how I always just _wished_ you would behave towards me. That _meant_ something to me, and you allowed it to. You fed into it... So don't tell me my _feelings_ are at fault here like I'm some dumb little girl. How do you think _anyone_ would feel in my position? Three and a half _years_ of trying to earn your respect, for it to finally be implied that I've succeeded and that it means _something_ to you, and you couldn't even wait for me to fucking get off your lap- to fucking un _mount_ \- before tearing me down? You couldn't even _look_ at me."

And by now, several tears _have_ escaped, but she's too angry to care. She wants to push him away from her so that she can leave; storm out of this hateful room with its cloying smell of candles and furniture polish. She wants to shove him as hard as she can, because a small part of her still hopes he'll tell her she's wrong- _so_ wrong- about all of this, and she can't _stand_ that foolish voice right now.

"I want you to move."

She finally states quietly, and House does as he's told slowly; rubbing uneasily at his scruff.

Rubbing at rough skin and coarse hair that had reddened her jaw; chafing but feeling wonderful all the same.

She watches his fingers before looking away. Touching her jaw. Touching smooth skin; pale and soft.

"I want you to leave me alone."

"The patient-"

"-Is the priority. I want you to let me do my job, and work this case, and do what's been _asked_ of me. I want you to ask for my help and give me yours when it's needed, but otherwise, I want you to leave me alone... If you _ever_ had any respect for me, if our conversations last night meant _anything_ , you'll do as I ask. I don't want to be one of your toys anymore, House. I spent a long time convinced it would be worth it; that _you_ were worth it. Platonically, romantically, emotionally- it doesn't matter. They've all applied over time... But I was wrong. It's not worth it. Not if this is _still_ what it feels like to be around you."

She sighs, and House wonders if the deep, almost nauseating wave of unease that washes over him feels the same as he makes her feel so often when he opens his mouth.

 _You were convinced she wouldn't leave you. Not_ Cameron _. Cameron forgives you everything, she always has. She will always be there for you. You can push and push and_ push _her, because she'll take it. She'll stay. She's_ incapable _of walking away. She can't. She wouldn't..._

Only, she is.

Stepping stiffly around him and pulling the candlestick out from between the door handles. She places it back where it belongs and he notes that her fingers tremble. She has her back to him, walking out the door- leaving him- and he is struck by the overwhelming urge to reach out and grab a handful of her hair. Thick hair that feels so soft and smells faintly of honey. He even raises his hand a little- fingers outstretched towards her- when she turns to regard him over her shoulder; her eyes hard.

"Don't worry. I'll wear a shirt with a high collar, all buttoned up tomorrow. Prim and proper just how you like it."

And then she's gone. Actually _gone_. Leaving him stood reeling from the fact in a small room dedicated to a deity he doesn't believe in.

"Fuck."


	29. Chapter 29

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Oh House, have faith (and turn it around!) Hope you enjoy as this sloooowly gets towards the next plot point! Thanks for reading as always :) Sorry this has been a bit slow in coming, been having a bit of a shit couple of weeks and writing has been at a minimum. More to come soon, though, and it would make my day if you leave a review :)

"Hey."

Cameron greets a little uncomfortably as she slips into the lab where most of Foreman's team are working behind various pieces of equipment.

"Hi."

Kutner nods politely, before turning back to Taub who stands beside him with his eye pressed to the lens of a microscope, showing no intent of looking up or acknowledging the blonde.

"Cam."

Foreman heralds from the corner, beckoning her over as he frowns down at a fresh print of test results. His expression is bleak, but when he looks up at Cameron he allows a small smile. He wears glasses which sit low on his nose, and she tries to think if she's ever seen him wear them before, but is uncertain. She'd guess they must have been recently prescribed, and probably only for reading, which would explain why they seem new to her. The dull wave of depression this realisation hits her with comes as a surprise, and she is brought back to the question she and House have each asked of the other, yet have refused to provide a straight answer to.

_Do you miss me?_

She had told him that she missed working for him- avoiding the underlying question- but seeing Foreman staring at her over the rim of a pair of glasses she'd not realised he owns solidifies this curious grief for her and makes it a reality. She misses the others. Her team. She misses the way things used to be.

"You're wearing glassses."

She states, offering Foreman a thin-lipped smile in return, and he raises a brow and nods

"So are you."

"I always have."

"Not always. You go without."

"Yeah, but then I wear contacts. You never used to wear either."

"I'm sorry... _Next_ time a factor of my health changes, I'll be sure to inform you."

"I just meant... I just didn't know you wore them is all."

She sighs, and Foreman studies the blonde curiously as she draws further into herself.

"...I got them about four months ago; mostly just for reading."

He elaborates finally, answering her query and negating to mention the fact that her eyes are slightly pink and he can tell she's been crying. In all honesty, he's not surprised; he'd been thrown by the way House had gone for her earlier, despite having believed there was little their old mentor could do that would catch him off guard.

"Oh."

She replies in a small voice, and Foreman sighs as he looks around at the others bent over their work and back up at the blonde. He needs her to get her head in the game and pitch him something new. _Anything_. Anything that will help them solve their current case. The others have gotten stuck in their way of thinking and obsessing about previous theories, and he knows that- in spite of having told her otherwise several times in the past- Cameron can be a huge asset when digging for ideas. She's done her homework and then some, and, thanks to House's unique style of torturing them over the years- has read an obscene about of obscure medical literature from cover to cover.

She'd left because of House. Not because diagnostics wasn't her strong suit.

Still, he feels uncomfortable ignoring the fact that she is visibly upset. They've had their differences, and he knows that she's always been closer to Chase than himself since way before the other two experimented with their brief romantic tryst. A part of him suspects that this has a lot to do with the fact that both he and the blonde are stubbornly headstrong, and had both known they were better at their jobs- although Cameron, at least, had never said so out _loud_ \- than Chase was ever going to be. They were rivals as much as colleagues at times, and there are certain aspects of her character that just drive him nuts. Regardless, he respects her, and now that they aren't working in perpetual close quarters with one another, he finds it a lot easier to like her. They've been on good terms since going their separate ways, and she is now one of the few people he would consider a genuine friend.

"Hey, look, we need to make some headway here, Allie, or we're going to be in over our heads. If we lose this one... That will be number _one_ for you, but number _three_ for us, and I'm not sure I can handle that. "

"It's always hard-"

"-The loss? Yes, it is. But, in all honesty, I was speaking selfishly. If I'm going to be leading this team, I _can't_ lose another patient. They're already skeptical."

He shakes his head with a furrowed brow, and Cameron glances at the others with mild surprise before pulling a face as she understands.

"House is going to give you a hard time either way."

"I'm not talking about House, I _expect_ it from him... But, look, _I'm_ the one that returned, okay? I'm one of House's old students that's come back and stirred things up, and now _I_ get given the coveted position of overseeing this shit-storm? Add _your_ guest appearance into the mix, and it's a regular alums club... We have more experience, so we have more to prove."

"...You know, you never _were_ great at motivational speaking."

Cameron grumbles, and this earns her a grin. Handing over a couple of sheets clipped to the back of his chart, Foreman ticks off a couple of tests and gestures towards the door.

"Go take a look at the patient. I know you've been trying to avoid it, but this is no longer me coming to you for a little outside help. This is your case too, now, and you were always good at picking up on things face to face with the problem... She's in rough shape though, Allie."

"I've seen my fair share of that, thanks."

The blonde replies stonily as she has never appreciated the others' implication that she might suddenly crack when faced with the ugly underbelly of the world.

"I know... But you bleed for people."

"Not really into that... Who have you been talking to?"

"Couple of the reception girls; they tell me everything-" Forman smirks, before continuing seriously "-What I mean is, _I_ see the way these girls look when they come in, and it bothers me. I'm disgusted that someone would do that to a person... But the part I'm losing _sleep_ over is how to solve what's destroying them from the inside so that I don't add to my death-count. That's what's keeping _me_ up at night... You don't work like that. You never have."

"Well, I mean, as much street cred as having an impressive death-count is sure to give me, I'd say it's something I _too_ try to avoid... Such a square."

"That's you all over... What I _meant_ is that _you_ stay awake because of what's happened to people, not because you can't figure out how to fix them. You feel for them, which is only natural, but the _amount_ you sometimes allow yourself to feel is unhealthy... And, yes, I _know_ you're a doctor, and I know you've been doing this a long time. I'm not questioning your ability or your personality or anything like that, I'm just warning you that this girl will be one of the worst you've dealt with... I'm warning you as much because you're dealing with this under House as I am because I'm worried... Well, about you."

"You don't need to worry about me."

Carmeon growls, and Foreman raises his palms in surrender, before pointing out silkily

"I don't know, I didn't _think_ a reliable old square would go and slice themselves up in the tub, but I was wrong about _that,_ so-"

"-I wish you would all stop making it sound like I was _crazy_! I was trying to deal with a problem, we do it every day!... If Chase hadn't knocked so loud, it would have been fine."

"Uhuh..."

"I had it under control."

"Sure you did."

"I... Look. I can take care of myself, okay? I'm not as weak as you think."

"... I never said that you were weak. I've not _thought_ it for quite some time, either."

Forman raises a brow at her bristling defence, and the blonde sighs as she runs a hand through her hair, before making a move towards the door.

"I'll go get scrubbed up and take these samples... _If_ you think I can _manage_ it, that is?"

"I hold out hope- its faint, but it's there."

Forman teases, chuckling at the icy look she throws over at him. Turning back to the vials he preps for testing, he follows up his mocking amiably

"With these cases the way that they are, we've been working shifts. Taub, Kutner and Hadley got pulled for this evening, which means you get off at seven. That's nonnegotiable as you're on from seven 'til seven tomorrow. Come get dinner with Chase and I... That's _also_ nonnegotiable; you look like crap."

* * *

"Are you even _watching_?"

Wilson frowns, as the blue team pitches the ball over the net, sending two of the green team sprawling in the sand. He has no idea what the letters in the corner of the screen stand for, and so resolves to call the women battling their way through a heated game of beach volleyball the green and the blue team. It doesn't really matter anyway; he has no interest in who wins. It's the playing of the game that counts...

_Or something like that._

"Yes, I'm watching. She cheated."

House mutters through a mouthful of pad Thai.

"How can you _tell,_ you were looking out the window?"

"I saw."

He insists, taking a sip of his beer before delving deeper into his noodles. The takeout place has sent them an extra order by mistake, and he and Wilson have split the fat helping of dumplings between them.

"What's with you today?"

Wilson asks for what feels like the fifth time, and he receives the standard response of a sigh and utter dismissal of his question. Accepting defeat, he pokes at one of the dumplings on his plate experimentally, before confiding

"I did tell Eleanor I would do that thirty day healthy eating plan with her."

"Eleanor's the busty mortician?"

"... Close. She's my ex-wife's niece."

"So, just don't tell her."

"I won't, but as they say, the scales don't lie."

Wilson sighs and House glances over while shoving a dumpling- whole- in his mouth and sermonising moodily

"And here I thought I'd _stopped_ sneaking you shots of Oestrogen."

"I'm just being supportive."

"Yeah... I'll bet that's your _only_ incentive."

"She's seventeen!"

"Well, give it a year and she'll be both legal and slimmer."

"That's dark."

Wilson hisses with a disgusted pull to his mouth. House nods in agreement as he struggles to swallow his overzealous mouthful, before studying the remaining dumplings thoughtfully.

"I think those always bothered her the most."

"Who?"

"Cameron."

"... Dumplings?"

"No. Comments about her weight. I used to make them all the time when she worked for me, even though I knew they bothered her."

"Yes, well, there is nothing more _amusing_ then harassing your staff..."

"True... I tend to spring for new material, though. Make sure all bases are covered."

"Yes, we were all really _disappointed_ in the monotony of your work... Perhaps you just felt like you'd struck gold?"

"...I think I just thought if I bullied her about it enough, she might slip up."

"How?"

"Explain why she _was_ that way; why she was so prickly about the subject. She says it was simple annoyance, but I never really knew for sure. At times, I refuse to believe that's all there was to to it; she used to be so _skinny_... It made it almost too _easy_ to keep digging at her."

"So... It was _her_ fault that you picked on her?"

"I kept on at her because I wanted to know what was wrong... I wanted to know how _bad_ it was... and of _course_ it was her fault!"

House finishes off waspishly, and Wilson raises a brow as he looks from the TV to his old friend.

"...What?!"

House demands as he catches dark eyes boring into him.

"Nothing... I'm just trying to figure out what part of volleyball, beer and asian fusion has led to us discussing Cameron..."

"...She'd look good in one of those little outfits... So would Thirteen."

House scoffs idly, tagging on this last bit as he catches the oncologist's brow raise ever higher.

"I doubt either of them would be willing to indulge you in that particular fantasy... That explanation also does little to explain your mood."

"What mood is that?"

"Do I _really_ have to dignify that with an answer?... I _told_ you getting involved with Allison was a bad idea."

"It's not my choice. The She-Devil put her on my case."

"Not what I meant... And I'm sure you're making her life just _delightful_ to show how grateful you are for her assistance."

Wilson rolls his eyes, and House huffs as he sips at his beer, before musing glumly

"I never got my answer, you know. I never _did_ figure Cameron out."

"Well... There's still time. You can irritate her into confession, I'm sure. I have total faith in you."

"No... She wants me to leave her alone."

"I'm sure she's told you that _countless_ times."

"She means it this time."

House frowns, and Wilson scratches his head as he regards his friend curiously; mystified by the morose expression clouding House's brow.

"So?... It's not like _you_ to actually _listen._ "

"This time I will."

"Why? What's changed?"

"Nothing. Everything... You were wrong, Boy Wonder."

"Wrong? About what?"

"About there still being time."

"How?"

"It's too late."


End file.
